


Paperback Writer

by BasicBathsheba



Category: Carry On Series - Rainbow Rowell
Genre: Baz pov, Costa, Dev is thirsty af, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Hijinx, M/M, Normal AU, Slow Burn, children’s author, fantasy books, professional catfishing, publishing au, queer fiction
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-15
Updated: 2019-05-30
Packaged: 2020-03-05 23:43:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 33,778
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18839197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BasicBathsheba/pseuds/BasicBathsheba
Summary: Baz Pitch loves his job. He’s a junior editor in his mother’s publishing company, and life would be perfect if it weren’t for two things: his boss, Davy Mage, and Sir Scone.Sir Scone is the bane of Baz’s life. Trite children’s fantasy with a golden hero and ferocious dragons and intrepid princesses. They’re wildly popular, and Baz hates editing them almost as much as he hates the man who writes them: Simon Salisbury, Mage’s pet project author, and also maybe, possibly, the most handsome man Baz has ever met.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello friends! This fic will be updating very regularly. This fic was requested very long ago but someone who took my survey. You did not leave your name, friend! But I hope you see this. This fic is for you 🖤

“Baz! Welcome back! Everyone missed you while you were gone.” Wellbelove smiles at me from her corner of the lift. “How was vacation?”

Vacation. Is that what they’ve been calling it? Has all of Pitch Publishing been acting like I’ve been off sunning in the Bahamas, drinking fruity cocktails and eyeing up sun tanned men for the past three months?

I wish.

I should have gone to the Bahamas, honestly. Or Majorca. I should have done anything but sit around my flat being angry and drinking with my delinquent aunt and waiting for Davy Mage to lift my “paid suspension.”

A vacation. Cute. Like employees who shout down the Pitch Publishing publisher in company-wide meetings get to go on three month vacations.

Frankly, I’m amazed he fabricated a story at all. Why not just tell everyone the truth? I got sent home “pending review” because I was impertinent and called him a fascist bastard, and if my name weren’t on the masthead that pays his checks, I’d have been on the kerb before he could snap his fingers?

Vacation.

“Brilliant, thank you,” I tell Wellbelove. “Do you like my tan?”

Wellbelove frowns at me for a moment, then nods, looking politely confused.

“Looks lovely.”

The lift dings on the fourth floor, where the other illustrators and the rest of the art department are housed, and Wellbelove files off, waving a cheery goodbye to me as she disappears in a pretty blonde blur.

I should really be nicer to her. We work together a lot, and it’s not her fault that she’s friendly. Our whole relationship is, admittedly, tainted for me by the circumstances of the project we work on, but once again, that’s not her fault. She’s good at what she does, and she’s nice to be around.

Unlike me.

Dev says I should make an effort to be kinder to people around here. I think Dev can get fucked.

The lift hits the sixth floor and I get off, making my way down the long hallway toward where my shoebox of an office sits. I know this level of the Pitch Publishing building intimately; I spent my whole childhood here, taking a left at the receptionist’s desk and kicking around in my mother’s old office, the corner one with all the light and the view of the Thames.

Mage sits in that office now, and I avoid it and his atrocious fucking mustache like the plague.

My coworkers call out hellos as I pass, and Dev slips me a subtle power fist without breaking off his conversation about a galley he’s trying to track down, and my nerves settle slightly. Whatever Mage may say or do to me, he can’t change this. He can’t change this building or the energy within in, the persistent sound of typing keys and murmured conversations and the smell of printer ink and floral carpet cleaner.

He may run my mother’s company, but he can’t make me hate it, even if he tries.

My office is as I left it: spotlessly clean. I throw my jacket across the back of my chair, set down my coffee and finally take off my sunglasses as I close the door and soak it in. My space. My small space, but mine. Almost no junior editors get their own offices, and I know mine was only given to me because of nepotism and an attempt by Mage to buy my favour, but I don’t care. It’s a status symbol and it’s _mine._

Galleys have been stacked on my desk to review, my phone is blinking with a dozen missed messages, and when I turn on my computer I see, to my absolute horror, that I have eight hundred unread emails.

Eight. Hundred. Emails.

I pull up my email calendar and block out the whole morning. _Shit wading_ , I write.

And then I dive in.

Half are emails I don’t need, others are solicitations from agents I’m on good terms with, and I put those off to answer throughout the week. Three emails from writers pitching me new book ideas. Two from Wellbelove asking me to review proofs. Four emails from Penelope Bunce, kindly asking me to respond to her email about the new _Sir Scone_ book.

And twenty-six from Simon Salisbury.

Simon Salisbury is the most successful of my writers, and also the one I hate the most. I never wanted to work with him, but he got shoved on me by Mage. I don’t even _do_ children’s literature, but that doesn’t matter. Mage wanted a big name assigned to him, and apparently there is no bigger name than Pitch, even if said Pitch is twenty-four and a junior editor.

I don’t know what Mage sees in Salisbury, but he can do no wrong. Mage “discovered” him while teaching a creative writing unit down at City. Mage is very big in “discovering” talent, like it’ll justify and validate his position as publisher. I was absolutely spitting when he assigned Salisbury to me. How does one even edit a children’s book? For Christ’s sake, there are _illustrations_ for each chapter.

But the _Sir Scone_ books are huge successes. People love them. They consistently hit best seller lists.

It’s because of me. They’re not even that good. _I’m_ the one who digs through the muck and messy sentences and makes them something worth reading. They’re just fantasy drivel about knights and princesses, and the most idiotic hero to ever grace the pages of children’s literature.

Sir Scone. A knight in golden armour who stands for justice and truth and starts out as a dragon slayer and ends up befriending the dragon. By book twelve he has a whole dragon crew and the princess he’s always saving ends up joining him on his adventures and learns to use a sword. It’s all childish and simplistic and unbearably charming.

And don’t even get me started on Simon himself.

Leaning back in my chair, I take a long sip of my coffee and settle in. Twenty-six emails. What a welcome back present. It’s almost like Salisbury knew I’d need a pick me up and had his special brand of endearing stupidity gift-wrapped for me.

 

 **SS:** Hey Baz, can you send me those notes you mentioned at our last meeting? Thanks.

 

 **SS:** Still waiting on those notes, mate.

 

 **SS:** Just a look out, Penny is sending you the new manuscript today. So if you could, you know, get back to me on that. It’d be a thing you should do.

 

 **SS:** Hey, Pen said she hadn’t heard anything from you about the new manuscript. Just curious what the deal is?

 

 **SS:** Hey, I know you’re busy, but if you could actually answer an email that would be great, thanks.

 

 **SS:** This is more than a bit rude, mate.

 

 **SS:** So it took you so long to answer my fucking email that I wrote another Scone book. I’m not sending it until you answer me though.

 

 **SS:** Here’s the book.

 

 **SS:** Seriously what is your issue, can you not answer your fucking email? This is wildly unprofessional.

 

 **SS** : So apparently you’re on vacation, but you should have put up an out of office email or something, that’s common courtesy.

 

 **SS:** How fucking long are you on vacation?

 

 **SS:** Did you go to fucking Mars? Jesus Christ mate.

 

 **SS:** Your cousin is as big of a dick as you are. Is it genetic or something?

 

 **SS:** I’m requesting a new editor.

 

 **SS:** Where! ARE! You!

 

 **SS:** Are you dead.

 

 **SS:** Just checking to see if you’re dead. Maybe you’ll email me back today. There are actual things about your actual job that I need to talk to you about.

 

 **SS:** What the actual fuck bro.

 

 **SS:** Hey idk if you heard about the possible Sir Scone television show? We just had a meeting about it and you weren’t there, and no one said anything about it.

 

 **SS:** I know you don’t like the books but it was kind of shitty of you to not make an appearance at all at that meeting. I should have the support of my editor. Way to fucking sabotage the whole project. Great move, mate.

 

 **SS:** Did you like quit your job or something are you off finding yourself.

 

 **SS:** Are you in Ibiza doing an eat pray love with shitty coffee.

 

 **SS:** I know you’re a rich posh prick but don’t you think this is a bit excessive?

 

 **SS:** Oh my God just answer your fucking email.

 

 **SS:**  THIS IS SO FUCKING CRAZY.

 

 **SS:** Hey when you get back from vacation, drop me a line. I’ve got a project I want to talk you about, maybe? Don’t tell Pen.

 

That was a fucking whirlwind. I hadn’t heard about any of this -- not the new book, certainly not the TV show. I’ll have to shout at Dev for that later, but for now I’m far too curious about Salisbury’s mental state. His emails give off the distinct vibe that he might be hunched over in a corner somewhere, rocking back and forth.

Draining my coffee, I scoot forward and open up a new email. I hesitate for a moment over what to say, and then I mentally smack myself. It doesn’t matter what I say. This is Simon Salisbury. He can barely speak English without me.

 

 **BP:** _I’m back and available to meet this week. In the future if you need to contact me, just use my cellphone number, which is and always has been listed in my email signature._

 

The email comes back almost immediately.

 

 **SS:** Today, 2? Costa???

 

Another comes slamming in.

 

 **SS:** Also welcome back asshole, you better be real fucking rested.

 

I grin and respond.

 

 **BP:** _I was. Until I had to read through twenty-six emails. See you at 2:15._

 

_***_

 

We have an entire city of cute cafes and slick coffee bars and moodily lit restaurants, and yet Simon Salisbury always insists on meeting me at the Costa that’s five minutes from the Pitch Publishing building.

He claims it’s convenient, but I think it just genuinely doesn’t occur to him that there are other options.

It’s classic Salisbury. He’s a best-selling author, but you wouldn’t know it. He still dresses as shabbily as he did the day I met him, in ratty sweatshirts and trainers. He’s at least switched out the plastic trackie trousers for joggers these days, but I don’t even know if I can call that an improvement.

Who even knows where all his money has gone. Certainly not into his hair, which he still shaves messily himself. I know he bought a house which probably ate up the majority of his early royalties, but he must be sitting on an absolute gold mine by now. Like one of his precious dragons.

“I got your coffee,” he says by way of greeting when I roll into the Costa at 2:25. I like making Salisbury wait on me.

“This is how you dress for a business meeting, really?” I ask, taking in his outfit. All things considered, he’s dressed nicely today in jeans and t-shirt, but I don’t say that. Salisbury and I have a carefully crafted relationship built on hostility and begrudging, unacknowledged mutual respect, and we both walk a fine line to preserve that. He doesn’t let on the depths to which he actually deeply hates me, and I don’t let on the depths to which I find his atrocious hair gorgeous and soft and his freckle-kissed hands impossible to look away from.

Like I said. Fine line.

“Where were you?” he asks, taking the lid off his coffee cup and blowing on it. “Who takes a three month long vacation?”

“I wasn’t on vacation.” I thought about lying, but then I decided against it. Let him know the truth. He fucking adores Mage, so I’m sure this will make him extremely uncomfortable. “Mage put me on suspension.”

“Suspension?” Salisbury asks, his voice far too loud and echoing around the Costa. A few people glance at us, but I don’t acknowledge it. “What did you do?”

“What makes you think I did anything?”

“People don’t get put on suspension for nothing.”

“Maybe I did.”

“No, you didn’t. What did you do?”

I pull the lid off my own coffee and lick at the foam swirled on top. He put cinnamon on top of the whipped cream, just like I always do. Sometimes he’s infuriatingly perceptive.

“Tell me about this project,” I say, side stepping the topic.

“What did you do?”

“Or tell me about this television show meeting. Dev didn’t have notes on it.”

“Dev wasn’t there,” Salisbury says, frowning. “It was just Mage, Pen and I and the reps from the studio.”

“When was this scheduled?” I ask. Even if I wasn’t around to actually attend the meeting, it’s still odd that no one told me it even happened. Salisbury is my anchor writer. None of my other authors have written as much as he has or had as much commercial success. Maybe because all my other manuscripts focus on queer fiction and horror.

 _Sir Scone_ really is an odd inclusion on my CV.

“I dunno. Been in my phone like six months or something,” Salisbury says, shrugging. “Anyway, I dunno if I’m going to go with it. They didn’t seem to really get the whole thing. They wanted to make the princess the love interest.”

“The princess isn’t the love interest, though,” I respond. “That’s the point. She saves herself.”

“Exactly!” Salisbury says. “And they wanted to make the dragon small and goofy like a pet. And have Sir Scone ride him.”

“But he’s not a pet. He’s a comrade, not a belonging.”

Salisbury slams the table with his hand and a woman with a baby at the table next to us looks up in alarm.

“I told them this! Yes! Exactly. You should have been there, you could have made them listen.”

Salisbury very rarely says nice things to me, and it’s knocked me a bit uneven, to tell the truth.

“I’ll attend the next one,” I tell him. “If there will be a next one?”

Salisbury nods, looking dejected. For someone who is about to get his works made into a television show, he seems extremely unhappy with the whole thing.

“Yeah, there will be,” he says glumly, sighing. “Mage is really on board with the whole thing.”

My eyebrow twitches. I’m sure he is.

“So. Project. What’s the big secret?”

Salisbury’s whole face changes immediately, the dejected expression making way for a closed off, bashful one. He looks -- almost embarrassed. Uncomfortable.

Interesting.

“I wrote another book,” he starts.

“Yes I know, you sent it to me.”

“No,” he says, shifting in his seat and picking at the lid of his coffee. “A different one. Not a _Sir Scone_ book.”

“Well, alright,” I say with a shrug, not understanding why this is such a big deal. “Have you sent it to Bunce? She’s your agent after all, have her send it along to me. Or, better yet, take it to someone who actually has an interest in children’s lit.”

“No, I haven’t shown it to her. It’s uh…” he leans in and lowers his voice like he’s about to tell me a state secret. “It’s not a kid’s book.”

“Okay?” I still don’t get it.

“No,” he says, shaking his head. He looks frustrated. “It’s… it’s an adult book.”

“Salisbury, it’s not the end of the world. Plenty of children’s authors write an adult book or two to palete cleanse. It’s not going to jeopardise your career.”

“No!” He growls in frustration and grabs at his curls. “No, I just mean… it’s… adult.”

Realisation drops on me, and a loud, startled laugh bursts out.

“Simon, did you write porn?”

“No!” he shrieks. The woman with the baby at the next table shoots us nasty looks and starts packing up her things. “No, it’s not like that, God, no. It’s just…,” he sighs and looks down at the table. “I mean, I just… I don’t know if Mage would be happy I wrote it.”

“I’m fairly sure Mage would market a bag of your shit if he could.”

Salisbury snorts and sighs. He doesn’t look reassured.

A maddening curiosity comes over me. I can’t help it. What the hell is this book? Salisbury is my age, but he functions on the emotional and intelligence level of a teen boy. I cannot begin to fathom what kind of adult story he would be compelled to write.

Especially one that the Mage wouldn’t like.

“Whatever,” I say, waving my hand. “Just send it over.”

“Yeah?” he says, looking up. His blue eyes are hopeful. I look away.

“Yes,” I respond. “I’ve had a stressful three months, I could use a laugh.”

The insult bounces off of him.

“Okay, Yeah, alright, I’ll send it over. Don’t tell Pen. She doesn’t know I wrote it.” He blushes. “I just wanted to see if, uh, you were interested in it first. See if it’s any good, you know?” He lets out a deep breath. “It’s really different.”

“I’m sure,” I say, finishing the last of my coffee and throwing it in the bin near us before standing up. “Send it over, I’ll read it when I get a chance. No promises on a rush, though, I’m a busy man.”

I collect my things and give him a nod, then turn to go.

“Hey, Baz?” he calls. I pause, turning back to him. “What did you do?”

I stare him down, maintaining eye contact for far too long.

“I killed a man,” I announce, ignoring the stares of the other Costa customers as I slide my sunglasses on and leave the cafe.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello and thank you for reading friends! Before we get into it, I wanted to give a shout out to @cynosure_phrases, whose fic “When Are We Not Dreaming” was a big inspiration for some of the plot you’re about to experience. I was sketching out what Simon’s book was about and was like, “man I feel like I’ve read this somewhere.” Womp.   
> If you HAVENT read that fic, I highly recommend it! Simon’s book is not this exact story, but there are a lot of similar themes. You can check it out here —> https://archiveofourown.org/works/15747540

“Holy shit.”

My whisper echoes across my dark kitchen. I don’t really know what else to think. It’s 4 a.m. I’m sitting on my kitchen counter because I came in here two hours ago to take a break from reading and get water, but I couldn’t stop reading, so I ended up just sitting on the counter and staying. My back is aching and my eyes are burning and I’ve just been knocked completely, entirely, irrevocably off my axis by Simon Salisbury.

I close my laptop and stretch my legs out. My toes push my half drunk tea into the sink and the tile is cold on my thighs. My pulse is racing. My head is still swimming with images, my stomach feels hollowed out. I’m in the midst of an immense book hangover. Brought on by the worst writer I know.

My eyes are still sensitive from staring at the bright screen of my laptop, and I blink into the dark. I can still see the words swimming in front of me like little dots in my vision.

_ The Knight dropped to his knees, his sword buried in his chest, his hands reaching out toward nothing. The Beast looked down on what he had done and began to weep. _

I haven’t stopped reading since Salisbury sent me the manuscript this afternoon. It took him five days to do so, which had thoroughly annoyed me because it had apparently been important enough to send me six hundred emails about, but suddenly there was no rush.

Just to punish him, I had resolved to put it aside to read next week and enjoy my weekend. 

But then I thought, well, I’ll just start the first chapter, get a feel for it, maybe have a laugh about it with the lads and pick it back up next week.

And then I didn’t stop.

The book starts in a familiar scene: a knight, the bravest in the land, carrying the weight of responsibility and honour. He’s taken in by a mentor and given an elevated rank, one the hero takes seriously, even if it’s weighing on him. A bit deeper than the usual  _ Sir Scone _ material, but not altogether that different.

But then a monster comes to attack the land, and the hero is dispatched to kill him. And that’s where shit gets good.

I cancelled evening plans with Dev and Niall and went straight home. I skipped wine and curry night. I  _ never _ skip wine and curry night. I read on my phone on the tube, even though I  _ never _ do that because it makes me feel sick, and I ate cold noodles straight out of my fridge while glued to my phone. 

I haven’t hunched over my sink like a rat to eat noodles since uni. And yet. I had to see what happened.

The Knight travels out, but instead of going on a quest to kill the Beast, he ends up in a cycle of contemplating the cost of life and how much he hates killing things. And when he meets up with the Beast — who is one of the best characters I’ve ever read — instead of killing him, the Knight falls in love. 

And in the end, the Knight sacrifices himself and turns into a beast.

Now I know why Salisbury was so anxious about sending it over. He’s right. It is different. It’s unlike anything I’ve ever seen from him. It’s unlike anything I would have expected from him. Christ, it’s unlike anything I’ve ever read.

And I’ve read a lot.

I open up my laptop again, even though I’ve just closed it, and pull up my work email.

 

**BP:** _ Costa. 10 am. _

 

*******

 

_ The Knight had never stopped to think. He’d never needed to: he thought with his sword, and he considered by his shield. _

_ “You don’t know what you want, do you?” the Beast asked him, staring down his long nose and flicking the blood off his fingertips with an easy motion. “Tell me what you want.” _

_ “I want you dead,” the Knight said. _

_ They both knew he was lying. _

 

There are a lot of questions I have for Salisbury. What made him write an adult novel? Why is he so obsessed with knights? Where has this vivid imagery and lush use of landscape been hiding all along? How the fuck did he manage to put so much emotion into a questing story? Why did I cancel my favourite activity of the week and sit on my counter and eat cold noodles last night?

And, most importantly. Why is the love interest a man?

I barely slept. Even when I got in bed I kept turning the book over in my head, approaching it at different angles. There was an actual, literal ache in my chest thinking about the garden scene where the Knight is falling apart at the seams because he’s been separated from the Beast. I didn’t cry when I read it, because I don’t cry, but it’s been sitting like a rock in my chest, turning over slightly and shoving things out of the way and swelling a bit when I breathe.

I never feel this way about books. Especially not fantasy.

Pushing my emotions out of the way, because they’re extremely unnecessary and unwelcome, I start jotting down editing notes and ideas while I wait for Salisbury at the Costa near work

He’s titled it  _ Dealing With Dragons, _ which will absolutely have to be changed. It sounds far too much like a  _ Sir Scone _ book, and also, the Beast isn’t even a dragon. That’s one of several revisions I’ve already got in mind, if I can stop my brain circulating around the queer love interest long enough to get into a work headspace.

I’m sketching out ideas on a napkin when someone clears their throat and I look up. Salisbury is standing in front of me, his hands in his pockets, his brow furrowed, looking — quite honestly — scared shitless.

He’s also wearing a button down shirt, which is weird as fuck. I mean, it’s blue and rumpled and he’s wearing a t-shirt underneath it, but still. Alarming.

“Let’s walk,” I say, sliding out of my chair and shoving the napkin in my pocket. I hand him the plain black coffee I bought him and head out of the Costa, not waiting to see if he’ll follow. He does.

“Is, uh, is everything okay?” he asks, hurrying to catch up. He takes short, forceful steps, which makes him unmatched with my long even strides. I slow my step a bit to let him catch me. “Just, it’s a Saturday, and, uh—”

“I read your book,” I cut him off. I don’t have time for mumbling, not when we’re on the verge of something.

“Oh.”

“I see why you were hesitant to send it through the normal channels.”

“Oh. Right.”

One of his shitty trainers scuffs at the ground, and he watches our feet as I lead us down the pavement and over toward the river bank.

“It was surprisingly good.”

His trainer scuffs again and he almost stumbles as he stares at me in wide-mouthed disbelief.

“Really? You liked it?”

“It was interesting. It needs edits — a lot of them,” I rush to add, “but there’s something there. Far more interesting than your  _ Scone _ drivel. Though, really, another knight?”

Snow shrugs, but it’s a light thing. Almost bashful. It’s cute. 

“I like knights.”

“Clearly,” I drawl, and look away from him. The tension between us is almost unbearable. I don’t know how to communicate positive things to him, and he doesn’t seem to know how to accept them. “But I do agree with what you said. Mage won’t like it.”

“You think?” he asks, hesitant. The bashful smile is gone.

Saying Mage won’t like it is an understatement. I’m shocked and glad Salisbury had the good sense to realise this to some degree.

“Not even remotely,” I say, looking away from him and focusing on the walk. I’m leading us vaguely toward South Bank, and the crowds of tourists and people are getting thicker, causing us to walk closer together. “He’s built a brand off of  _ Sir Scone _ , and a queer knight story won’t fit that brand.”

“Oh.” Salisbury looks deflated, like I’ve just popped his balloon. “Yeah. That’s what I thought.” He stares down at the ground and shoves his hands in his pockets as we shoulder between people. 

He’s shockingly accepting of this news. I’d expected him to fight more, honestly, and there’s an odd part of me that can’t handle seeing him look this disappointed.

“Stop looking like I’ve just kicked your dog,” I snap, elbowing him accidentally as I duck a family of tourists. “My suggestion is that we publish it under a different name, and don’t tell Mage it’s you.”

“What?” Salisbury pulls up short, and I stop so that I don’t lose him. His eyes are huge, his face scrunched up into a mask of confusion, completely oblivious to the sea of people moving around us. “He’s the publisher. He found me. I’ve got to tell him.”

“He won’t publish it.” I hate being so blunt, but it’s true. He won’t. “Not if he knows it’s you. He won’t take the risk.”

“Maybe if we talked to him—”

“Salisbury. Trust me. If he’s trying to sell a kid’s show, do you think he’s going to risk any chance of the news articles claiming Sir Scone is gay and fucking a dragon?”

Salisbury’s face turns a bright, ugly red, and I watch the splotches climb their way up his neck and over his ruddy cheeks.

“He’s not  _ gay _ ,” he sputters, shoving his hands in his pockets as a passing old lady gives us a foul look. “And he doesn’t— I mean, the Beast isn’t a—”

“First lesson, Salisbury. If you’re going to write a sex scene, you don’t get to be embarrassed by it.”

He mumbles something and kicks at the ground, and I sigh.

“I’ll say this once, so listen,” I tell him, steeling myself. I grab his elbow and steer him over toward the bank, out of the middle of the pavement and the hordes of tourists. “This book is good. It’s very good. The writing is unexpectedly advanced from you, the character work is well done, and the sex scenes were new and different.” His face goes blotchy again, and I don’t blame him for his embarrassment. The sex scenes were… something. Not even particularly raunchy. Just terribly, horrifically sentimental. Almost uncomfortably tender.

“It’s a good addition to the field of queer literature, which is largely missing anything like this,” I say, hurrying past the awkward. “So I would like to make sure it gets published, and I would like to have my name involved in getting it out there. And I promise you, if Mage is brought into this discussion, that will not happen.”

Salisbury is silent for several long moments, and I can see his brain turning.

“How will you do it though, if Mage doesn’t know?” He looks up at me hesitantly, his face screwed up in a mask of uncertainty.

I’ve thought of this. It was one of the many things racing through my head last night. 

“We put a pen name on it, and I say I found it in the slush pile. I get two discretionary picks a year, and I usually choose queer fiction anyway. This can be one of them.”

Salisbury stares at me like I’m a fucking dragon, his jaw almost open in confusion.

“You’d do that?” he asks, letting out a heavy breath of air. “It’s just… you don’t even like me.”

I bite down a sigh. He’s right. I don’t like him. I don’t like the books that made him famous, and I’ve bitched about working with him every day since I took this job. There has been no attempt to keep my animosity toward him a secret, and he hasn’t tried even once to mitigate it or turn it into friendship. I made me an absolute beast to him sometimes, but he gives as good as he gets.

But there’s still a sharp little ache in my chest that twinges when I think about the Knight, bleeding out in the garden, and the Beast holding him in his arms. 

That’s why I’m doing this, I suppose. No other reason.

“It’s good business,” I say, trying to sound dismissive. “I like your book. I like queer stories. I want it out there. Are we agreed?”

I hold out my hand, and it hangs between us. I can see the indecision on his face: every emotion is played out in excruciating showy detail, and so I can tell the moment he decides. He narrows his eyes, squares his jaw and nods, reaching out to grab my hand in a firm shake.

His hand is warm and calloused.

“Agreed.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! I know it seems like this is a daily updating fic, but it’s not, it just keeps happening that way. Anyway. Thanks for reading and enjoy!

“We’ll need to give you a new name.”

Salisbury nods eagerly over his tikka masala and quickly swallows. In his excitement to speak, he accidentally tosses his fork down to the plate with a loud _clang_ and a bit of curry goes flying off to land on my sleeve.

I stare at it.

We’re meeting the Indian restaurant near work for lunch because I don’t want him in and out of the building. Bunce is usually involved in high level _Sir Scone_ discussions, and Mage always comes sniffing around, and I didn’t want to have to explain why Salisbury and I are working so closely on something when all of the moving parts for his _Scone_ books have largely been set in place.

“I’ve been thinking about this,” he says, leaning in conspiratorially. “What about Simon Snow?”

I blink.

“Absolutely not. Next.”

“Next?” he asks, offended. “I don’t have a next, that’s all I came up with.”

“Well it’s atrocious.”

“I like it!” he growls. “What’s wrong with it?”

“First off, it’s far too close to your real name,” I say, ticking off his stupidity on a long finger. “Secondly, Snow? It’s too close to Scone, and Simon Snow sounds like a fairy tale character. No. I was thinking something sensible. Like Oliver Rowell.”

“Oliver Rowell?” He shakes his head. “Jesus, Baz, I’m not naming myself after the bloke who caused a civil war. What the fuck?”

“That’s…” I pause, staring at him. A confused puff of air escapes me. “Do you mean Oliver Cromwell?”

“Oh.” Salisbury squints down at his food, shrugs, and picks up his fork again. “Well, whatever. I don’t like it.”

“Well, tough. That’s your name.” _Oliver Cromwell_. Jesus Christ. How did Salisbury pass school? How did he function before me?

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes, it is.”

“No, it’s not.”

“Yes it—” I stop myself and rub at my brow. “Look, I actually have work to do today that doesn’t involve squabbling with you. Believe it or not, I have other authors. Who actually respect me. Let’s split the difference. Oliver Snow?”

He looks ready to argue back, just for the hell of it, but he pauses and stares at me suspiciously, like there’s some plot to my offered compromise. For once in my life, there isn’t. I just actually do have work to get to before Mage comes panting after me for it. “Alright. Yeah, I like that. Why Oliver, though?”

I shrug.

“I watched _Oliver & Company _ with my little brother last weekend. You remind me of the kitten.”

“I’m— what the fuck, Baz?” He pauses. “You have a little brother?”

“Now, one more piece of business.” I push back my plate and prop my arm on the table as I lean in. Salisbury keeps shovelling food into his mouth, now that we’ve settled the name argument, but I know he’s not going to like what I have to say next. “You have to tell Bunce.”

I hold up my hand before he can get a word out.

“I’m sorry, it’s non-negotiable. She’s your agent. And I don’t work with unrepresented authors, and she’ll skin us both if she finds out we went behind her back.”

“But—”

“I will also add that it’s not at all unusual for me to send unrepresented authors her way, as you very well remember. She represents several of my authors, and she’s worked with me on two separate queer novels. Mage knows Bunce is a school friend of mine, it won’t raise eyebrows.”

It’s a bit of a stretch to call Bunce a school friend. More like school nemesis. But she does good work and I respect her judgement, even if I am vaguely terrified of her. And she and Salisbury are thick as thieves. It’s odd he hasn’t clued her in.

“I thought the whole point of this covert book plot thing was for no one to know?”

“It was for _Mage_ not to know,” I correct. “I don’t care if Bunce does.”

“It’s just…” he worries at the napkin in his lap and looks down. Tendrils of his sloppy curls fall into his eyes. “I was hoping we didn’t have to tell her.”

I narrow my eyes.

I’ve a theory about Salisbury. And this book. And his general intense embarrassment surrounding this book. I haven’t brought it up because, despite my blistering curiosity, it’s none of my business. But now it’s getting in the way of progress.

“Bunce doesn’t know you’re gay, does she?”

His head snaps up, eyes wide, expression frantic as he glances around the restaurant, like one of the diners are going to recognise him and run to tell _The Daily Mail_. Theory confirmed, then.

“No! I’m not— I’m not _gay_ , exactly,” he hisses, leaning in. “I don’t know what I am, honestly, I dunno. I haven’t figured out the word. But… no. Pen, uh, doesn’t know.”

“Why? She won’t care, she’s not homophobic.” I take a sip of my water and try to wash down my satisfaction at being right. “Clearly, since she puts up with me.”

“No, it’s not…” He huffs and starts mangling the napkin in his lap. “No one knows.”

The satisfaction is replaced by a sharp acidic tang as the full meaning of his words hits me.

No one knows. No one but me, then. I’m the only person he felt comfortable sharing this with.

“You were prepared to publish this under your real name, though,” I say softly. Far more softly than I intended, actually, but I’ve rather been shocked into gentleness. “What were you expecting?”

“I dunno.” He sighs and rubs at the back of his neck with a freckled hand and stares down into his tikka masala like it holds the answers of the universe. “I didn’t really think, I guess. I just… I started writing it, not knowing where it was going, and then it just developed into... you know, what it is. And I didn’t really stop to think about it, you know? I just, uh, wanted to know what you thought. And then figured I’d take it from there.”

“You didn’t plan for the Beast to be a man?” I ask, hesitant. He shakes his head.

“No, I knew that. I just didn’t expect for it to be a love story.” He shrugs and sighs again and pushes his plate away from him with a look of heartbreaking dejection. “It took me about three months to write and everything happened so quickly and then I was pretty much at the end of the book by the time I realised what that probably meant about me.”

“Is that—” I pause, searching for words, and adjust my seat so I’m not leaning in as much. How does that even happen? Was he halfway through one of his tender sex scenes when it hit him? How does someone even _do_ that? “Was this the first time you realised…”

He frowns at the napkin, which is wrinkled and crushed into complacency, and nods.

“Yeah, kinda. I mean, it’s one of those things where shit makes sense in hindsight. I just never stopped to like, think about it. And now… I dunno. I guess it just never hit me, you know?”

“No,” I tell him, because I can’t help but be bluntly honest. “I’ve pretty much always known.”

“Oh.” He looks dejected, and I wish I could offer him some consolation, but I can’t. I’ve been confidently gay for as long as I can remember. I don’t have any idea what he’s going through.

Instead I clear my throat and catch the waiter’s eye.

“Don’t worry about this so much, Salisbury. You’ll get wrinkles.”

He rolls his eyes and mutters something, then sits back in his chair. A lazy sprawl to mimic my own, like we’re friends out for a lunchtime catch up and not professional peers trying to catfish my nemesis.

“I am going to tell Penny,” he says with a dejected sigh. “Eventually. She should know. It’s the right thing to do, isn’t it?”  
    “It is,” I say, accepting the bill and handing the waiter my company card. “But there’s no rush. The book will be there. I’m just waiting for you to say go. Take all the time you need.”

“Really?” he asks, surprised. I love that I keep throwing him. Our whole relationship is like a perfectly choreographed fight where we just keep surprising each other. “You’ll sit on it till I’m ready?”

I don’t tell him that there’s a small, tiny part of me that is thoroughly shaken at the fact that he found out he’s gay through a book. That said tiny part is giving me more empathy than I previously would have thought myself possible of. I also don’t tell him I’d wait until the end of the world for the opportunity to go behind Mage’s back like this.

So instead I settle for a different, but still uncomfortable, truth.

“It’s a good book, Salisbury. And good things take time.”

 

***

 

_“I used to think all I had in life was death. Delivering it, escaping it. Living with it.”_

_The Beast look down at the Knight, sprawled out across the Beast’s chest, and slowly ran his long, pale fingers through the Knight’s hair. It had been blond once, the Knight thought. But now it was bronze. Like blood rusted onto steel._

_“All I am is death,” the Beast said. “That’s all I know.”_

_The Knight closed his eyes against the Beast’s gentle touch._

_“I don’t think so,” he said. “I think you’re more alive than anyone I’ve ever met.”_

 

***

 

 **SS:** she’s in

 **SS:** penny

 **SS:** she wants you to send her a contract when you can

 

I glance away from where Mage is droning on about this month’s scheduled releases to focus on my phone. It’s wildly unprofessional to text during a staff meeting, but what’s Mage going to do? Suspend me? Fuck if I care anymore. I’ve got nothing to prove to him, or anyone. If people can’t see how atrocious he is at this job — how he prioritises quantity over quality, how he favours authors, how he ignores staff advancement — then why waste my energy trying to prove myself to them?

 

 **BP:** _I know. She sent me an email this morning._

 **SS:** oh. that was fast. i just told her last night

 **BP:** _It’s 2 pm._

 **SS:** i may have possibly just woken up

 **BP:** _Jesus, man. Pull yourself together._

 **SS:** i may have gotten very drunk to tell her

 **SS:** there may have been tears

 **BP:** _You’re pathetic._

 **SS:** shut the fuck up

 **BP:** _That’s not very professional._

 

“Mr. Pitch. Are we boring you?”

I glance up from my phone to see Mage and the entire editorial department staring at me, and I slide my phone back into my pocket.

“Apologies,” I say, mustering as much politeness as I can. “I was responding to an author query.”

Mage nearly quivers with excitement. God, he’s like a dog with a bone.

“Which author? Simon?”

I could say yes, and he’d leave it be. He’d let me text the whole rest of the day if he thought I was working on a _Sir Scone_ book, but then he’d also be up my ass about the details.

“No,” I lie. “A new one.”

“New author?” Mage frowns. “I didn’t know you’d signed someone new. That wasn’t in your department report.”

“Well as you might have caught,” I say, smiling my most infuriating smile, “he’s new.”

Dev coughs, and Wellbelove bites down a smile as Mage stares at me and clears his throat. “Then by all means, share with the class.”

I lean back in my chair and tap my pen against my notebook and catch Dev’s eye. He’s got that squinty face on that he makes when he’s begging me to not do something stupid. I see it a lot. During the last department meeting I was at — which ended with a shouting match — Dev looked like he was constipated throughout the entire thing.

“His name is Oliver Snow,” I say, deciding to be polite. For Dev’s sake. “He’s one of my discretionary picks for the year. A queer fantasy.”

“Ah.” I can see Mage shut down at the word _queer_. “Who sent him?”

“Found him in the slush,” I lie. “I’m directing him to Bunce. It’s her kind of content.”

“Right, well, be sure to run it through legal. Trixie, where are we at with those galleys for the new _Sir Scone_?”

Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I keep it below the table and flip to my emails as I pull up the deeply threatening email Bunce sent me this morning.

 

**_Penelope Bunce_ **

**_RE: Dealing With Dragons representation_ **

 

**_You better know what you’re doing with him, Pitch. I’ve still got photos from uni and I will end your career._ **

 

A new text from Salisbury comes slamming in before I can reply to her with a threat of my own.

 

 **SS:** so… what now?

 **BP:** _now we start editing_


	4. Chapter 4

Salisbury licks his lips and stares me in the eye as he leans forward across the table. He smells like cinnamon aftershave and the strange orangey ale he’s been nursing. He’s like all the smells of my childhood Christmas rolled into one and it’s making me heady.

“ _Dancing With Dragons_.”

“That is basically a _Game Of Thrones_ book,” I correct, leaning back against the sticky lacquered booth of Salisbury’s neighbourhood local and reaching for my ale. I need to get away from the heady sweet and spicy cloud of him. “Next.”

“ _Dragon Heart._ ”

“I have seen that movie and hated it.” I think I actually may have cried during it, but I was ten and that was another lifetime ago, so I’m not going to dwell on it.

“ _Sword and Scale_.”

“Not the imagery you’re thinking of. Also, The Beast isn’t a dragon.”

Salisbury collapses back against the booth and huffs. The whole table shakes with the movement, and his knee knocks it again when he stretches out his leg. One trainer taps against my Oxford, but he doesn’t seem to notice, and it stays there.

“This is fucking useless,” he says, taking a long pull of his ale. He smacks his lips together as he swallows and lets out a little _ah._  “Why do you have the change the name? You’ve never changed the name of any of my other books.”

“Because those names were fine for _Sir Scone_. But this is a different beast. No pun intended.”

“ _Slayer_.”

“Why do you keep picking names that are already well known?”

Salisbury drains his drink and slams the empty back on the table. He’s slightly buzzed, stuck in a comfortable fog, and I like him like this. He’s both pricklier and more enjoyable, and with each drink he gets gruffer and his words get more growled.

He also laughs like a donkey, which is something I’m horrifically delighted to have discovered.

“I’m getting another round,” he mumbles, shoving his way out of the booth and toward the bar. His trainers scuff against the uneven floor boards, and he passes cramped tables with smiles and small waves of hello.

I’ve never been here before; Salisbury suggested it. It’s not far from my flat, but I don’t really seek out pubs. If I’m drinking, I’m more likely to sit at home with Fiona and get sloshed, and if I’m drinking with friends I’m a club or wine night kind of man, but this is nice. Classic. Traditional. A sturdy sort of working class pub with a wide ale selection, warm lighting, and music that I actually know.

And Salisbury looks more comfortable here than I’ve ever seen him. The odd blonde lady in the goat shirt working the bar knows him, and as we walked in he clapped two old men on the back and exchanged a firm handshake with a third, so this is definitely somewhere he frequents.

I wonder if he comes alone and sits at the bar and chats with the old men, or if he and his friends have a standing pub night. I don’t really know about his friends, other than Bunce. I don’t really know anything about him at all, come to think of it. It’s hard to imagine a version of Salisbury that exists outside of Costa and my email.

When he returns to the table he sets down two pints — a dark ale for myself, something smooth and amber and orangey for him — and scoots back into the booth.

“This pub is nice,” I say, loosening my tie and shrugging off my jacket. I throw it over the back of the booth and let my arm rest there. It’s extremely cosy here, even if it is sticky. “You a regular?”

“Oh, er, sort of,” Salisbury says, scrubbing his hand through the hair at the back of his head and shrugging. “I come here a decent amount, but I used to work here.”

“Really?” My mind delivers me a vivid image of Salisbury as a bartender. White towel thrown over his shoulder, talking with the pensioners and football fans. I can see it too well.

“Aye. I worked here through uni and then for a bit after, when the books were first starting up. I only quit last year, actually.”

I almost choke on my beer.

“You worked at a pub until last year? What about all the royalties from the books?”

He shrugs and plays with the edge of his pint glass, rubbing his thumb around and around it.

“Well, yeah, those were nice, but I didn’t want to rely on them, yeah? And I gave away most of my money when I started anyway. Took me awhile to decide to buy the house and set up my stipend and start, you know, regulating it. That was Penny, to be honest, she got me sorted out.”

I stare at him.

“You _gave away_ your money? Who did you give it to?”

I can’t keep the absolute amazement out of my voice. I’ve always wondered what he did with it. I knew it didn’t go into his wardrobe. He shrugs.

“Just stuff. Kids, you know.”

“Kids?”

“Yeah, kids! You know, like, charities and stuff. For kids who were in the system or didn’t get great educations and stuff.”

“That’s…” I’m almost speechless. How have I never heard of this? A children’s author giving away heaps of money to needy kids? “Why?”

“Well, I was a kid like that. It was a miracle I got into uni at all, given that I came from a home. Then I got money and I thought it was a fluke so I didn’t want to rely on it, and it felt weird just sitting on it, so…” he shrugs. “I gave it away.”

I didn’t know he’d come from the system. I’ve never asked, to be fair. I don’t know anything about Salisbury’s life before Mage found him in that creative writing class. But now that I think about it, there has never been a mention of his family. No one comes with him to events other than Bunce.

At all the congratulatory book release dinners I’ve been dragged to, Salisbury has always come alone.

“Does Mage know?” I can’t believe that he would miss an opportunity to set up some kind of _Sir Scone_ charity for needy kids with blue eyes. He’d market the fuck out of it.

“Nah,” Salisbury says, shrugging one shoulder. “Why should he? I’m out of that part of my life. No need to keep bringing it up. Anyway, I doubt he’d care.”

Mage would care. Mage would find a way to make money off of it, honestly.

I take a slow sip of my ale and stare him down. I don’t want to start a fight by bringing up Mage and his obsession with Salisbury. I feel like I’ve just been given a glimpse into an entirely different person. Once again, I’ve been trusted with something no one else knows.

I don’t want to spoil it.

“Simon Salisbury, you are an enigma.”

He gives me the smallest of smiles, and then suddenly it’s gone, his eyes going wide, his face lighting up, eager excitement washing out that quickly shy and — dare I say it — sweet smile.

“ _The Sword and The Dragonstone!_ ” he shouts, slamming the table. A snort of laughter escapes me, to my immense horror. It’s the beer. Alcohol always makes me laugh, I should have known better.

“Seriously, at this point you have to just be fucking with me, I swear,” I drawl.

Salisbury grins, and it’s like a challenge. Never one to back down, I grin back. Dev says I look terrifying when I smile, but Salisbury doesn’t look scared.

“ _Slay Or Be Slain_.”

“ _Slay or Lay_.”

He slams the table again, but he’s smiling.

“It’s not a porn book!”

I raise an eyebrow. “The multiple sex scenes beg to differ.”

“ _Slayed_?”

“That’s basically _Laid._  What about… _Slain_?”

He chews on it. I can see him working it over, his eyes narrowing a bit, his teeth chewing on the skin of his lip, his nostrils flaring as he takes a deep breath. It’s like all of his natural body movements are exaggerated for outrageous effect. Just watching him swallow is an affair.

He nods slowly, once, then again, faster.

“I like it. _Slain_ , by Oliver Snow.”

“I want art for the cover, not some porny buff stock model,” I tell him. There’s a warm satisfaction running through me at having won this battle and finally decided on a name. “I’m thinking a haloed knight, sword through his chest.”

Salisbury’s blue eyes light up.

“His cloak should start to look like wings!”

“Excellent.” I raise my drink. “To _Slain_.”

Salisbury smiles at me with the force of siteen suns and raises his drink.

“To _Slain._ ”

“While we’re talking changes,” I say, putting my glass down, “let’s talk about the ending.”

Salisbury gives me a look that is uncannily similar to the expression my stepmother’s dachshund makes when someone tries to take food away from him.

“What about it?”

“I hate it.”

“What?” he yelps. “No.”

“Yes,” I say. “I hate it a lot. The Beast finally finds the sword that cursed him, and the Knight tells the Beast to stab him so his curse can be lifted, and he _does it_? And then when the curse transfers to the Knight the Beast just… forgets him? No way.” I shake my head and make a face. “Absolutely not.”

“What’s wrong with that?”

“It’s depressing as fuck. And the Beast would never agree.”

Salisbury snorts.

“He’s a Beast.”

“He’s in love,” I correct. “The Knight is the only good thing in his life. He’d rather die than pass his curse to the man he loves. It’s an unsatisfying character arc.”

“But the Knight has to make his final sacrifice and wrap up his arc,” Salisbury argues. “He does it because he loves the Beast. It’s not meant to be happy. Life isn’t happy.”

God, he’s spent too much time with Mage if he thinks good literature can only come from suffering. I never would have pinned Salisbury as falling into the Straight Male Author trap.

“If you insist on driving away your readers with a depressing ending, then the Knight should kill the Beast and put him out of his misery.”

“The Knight would never do that.”

I raise an eyebrow.

“See my point?”

Salisbury sighs and takes a long pull of his ale, then furrows his brow and stares down at the table top.

“Okay,” he says, pausing. “What if the Knight stabs _himself_ and becomes a Beast?”

“Why do you want him to become a Beast so badly?” I ask, trying to keep down a laugh. This is a weird one, and I cannot for the life of me understand why Salisbury is so married to this.

“He’s been through a lot,” he says, shrugging. “I want him to bear the scars of it.”

He looks down at the tabletop as he says it, and a small shiver runs down my spine. It makes me wonder what he’s been through. What scars he’s bearing that I can’t see.

Maybe this book was helping him work through more than just his sexuality.

“That’s dark, Salisbury.”

He shrugs and fidgets in his seat, flicks at his pint glass, musses his hair, and sighs. He’s so _noisy_. Everything he does is full of movement and noise, and he’s like a show to watch.

“What if… what if he gives the Beast something? Part of his humanity?” Salisbury asks. His voice is distant, his eyes glazed over. Is this how he comes up with story ideas? I’ve never gotten to watch one of my authors actually work through their process. “What if he… what if he lets the Beast drink from his blood?”

He looks up, eyes wide, smiling and excited, and I can’t help it. I snort.

“Is this a kink? Is the next book you send me going to be full of bloodplay or something?”

Salisbury’s neck flushes and he makes a disgusted face.

“Why do you even know that word?”

I hide my grin behind my pint glass.

“I like vampires.”

Salisbury shakes his head and makes a boking noise. “I don’t want to know any of this.”

“You’re saying you don’t like vampires?”

“No, I do, but that doesn’t mean I like… _that._ ”

“Mhm,” I hum, unconvinced. “You do know what it is though, which is interesting.”

“You know too!”

“I read for a living, and I have a healthy curiosity. What’s your excuse?”

“I— I don’t—”

“So, the ending,” I interrupt, cutting him off before he peels off his skin in embarrassment. The man has some serious hang ups about sex, and I plan to slowly and methodically make him deal with each and every one of them, just so I can watch him contemplate setting himself on fire.

“I like it how it is,” he mutters, adjusting himself in his seat.

“I still think it should be happier,” I say, deciding to let him off the hook for tonight.

“I’ll think on it. The Knight is still getting stabbed, though,” he says, his jaw clenched and determined. He looks so serious and it’s almost impossible not to smile at him. “Whatever happens, the Knight has to be stabbed.”

“Salisbury, this is officially a kink.”

“Please don’t say that word,” he mutters, flushing again. But there’s a smile there. A bashful, annoyed little smile.

Maybe I won’t let him off the hook for tonight.

“Would you prefer fetish?”

“Oh my fucking God.”

“Your kinks are valid, Salisbury,” I continue. I’m enjoying myself more than I have in months. “No need to be embarrassed. You’re a grown man, it’s fine to have a fetish.”

“You alright here, Simon? You or your friend need another?”

Both of us look up to see the towering woman in the goat shirt standing near our booth, smiling far too widely. Salisbury makes a choked noise and looks like he wants to die.

I cannot stop my smile.

“Er, no, thanks Ebb,” he squeaks. “We’re good.”

“Well, you boys just let me know if you need anything,” she says, grabbing the empties from the table next to us and walking back toward the bar.

Salisbury looks up with a fire in his eyes that could burn me on the spot.

“You’re a fucking monster,” he growls, scrubbing his hands over his face and reaching to take a sip of his ale.

I shrug.

“I’m not the one with the blood kink.”

I grab my jacket and slide out of the booth while Salisbury is busy wiping up the ale he’s spit all over his chin.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello hello! I hope you liked the laughs in the last chapter. Let’s change course now, shall we?
> 
> Also someone make me stop writing snippets of Slain, it’s becoming a problem.

_The Beast was angry._

_He had made no movements, had said no words, but the Knight could tell. He could tell in the way dark eyes flashed, in the small clenching of a jaw, in the way the Beast’s long fingers had gone still._

_“I have to go,” the Knight said. “I was never meant to stay this long.”_

_“Then go,” the Beast said, turning away to stare out the thin window set into the wall of his keep. “You’ve already overstayed your welcome.”_

_The Knight felt the pierce of the Beast’s cold words sharper than any steel._

_“You could come with me?” he whispered, crossing the room. The rest of the words felt stuck in his throat, choking him from within, desperate to get out and yet_ —

_The Beast turned his head to the side to level a cool gaze at the Knight over his shoulder._

_“And why would I do that?”_

_“So we could be together. So we could—”_

_“Go,” the Beast interrupted, turning to stare out the window again. “I’ve grown tired of your weak humanity. If you expect me to fall to my knees and trail you like a dog, you clearly know nothing about me.”_

 

I lean back in my chair and run a hand over my lips. The scene is getting better. This is an improvement to the last version, where the Beast was even more cruel to the Knight. That’s been one of my main suggestions — toning him down a bit. Softening him, to help readers see what the Knight sees.

Clicking over to my chat window, I type up my thoughts. Salisbury has no life and is always hanging around on his computer or phone, so it’s easier to send him my edits and thoughts in a chat than compose it all into an email. I never do this with authors — usually I have a very rigid communication schedule and routine with them, but everything about this project has been different.

There’s a good chance that if Mage finds out about what we’ve been doing, he’ll fire me. So somehow that helps me ease my concerns about blurring the lines of professionalism a bit. Not that Mage would even know what those are.

 

 **BP:** _Better. Perhaps switch the library scene to here — with the Beast leaning into the embrace_ — _and cut out the bit in the middle with the Knight’s practise yard sword scene. Just cut after the sex scene to the Knight riding away and end Part II there._

 

 **SS:** The sword practise scene is crucial though. It shows the Knight literally fighting against himself to stay.

 **SS:** I love that scene.

 

I roll my eyes. Yes, of course I know that. The reader knows that too. Honestly, Salisbury doesn’t have to be so overwrought with his imagery

 

 **BP:** _I’m saying we cut it._

 **SS:** No

 **BP:** _This isn’t up for negotiation._

 **SS:** You’re being stupid. Pub, 6? I’ll convince you.

 

***

 

Salisbury looks like he’s about to hit me. He’s huffing and tugging at his curls and looks seconds from exploding, and I love it.

“Don’t you think this emotional growth is better served earlier in the story?” I sit back in the booth and cross my ankle over my knee and observe him. “It comes in too late.”

Salisbury groans and practically throws himself back against the booth. It shakes with the motion, like he’s a hurricane of creative frustration and our usual table in the back corner is the prime target of his destructive powers.

I’ve already decided to let him keep the scene as is. I decided that on my walk over to the pub after work. This whole conversation has just been an exercise in annoying him. And possibly dragging out the evening.

“No,” Salisbury says. “He needs that moment with the sword practising to come to terms with things and realise his own heart.”

“So you’re telling me the whole story, he’s just been plodding along, not thinking things through?” I ask. “That whole bit about ‘I think by my sword’ is literal?”

“Yeah.”

I scoff and take a sip of my ale.

“That’s insane, no one does that.”

Salisbury leans forward and shrugs. His hair is a disaster, the string of his hoodie is uneven and his freckled face is flushed with drink. He’s messy and adorable in the low light of the pub, and I’d argue with him all night, I think.

“I dunno,” Salisbury says, suddenly serious. “I do.”

“What?”

The change in tone catches me off guard. I’m still not used to how he does this; switches from fired up and ready to fight to achingly earnest at the drop of a hat.

“I do that,” he says. “I deliberately don’t think about things. Until I’m either forced to or it’s hit a point where it’s safe to think about it. Otherwise, it just drives you mad, yeah?”

I stare at him for so long that the truth gets pulled out of me without having even made a conscious decision to answer. “No. I’ve never not thought about anything for a moment in my life. All I do is think about things. I think about everything.”

Salisbury shrugs, scuffs at his hair and picks back up his ale, gesturing it at me like he’s conceding a point.

“Well, that’s what makes you you. And so good at this job.”

“Oh.” I glance down at the table for a moment and shift. I wasn’t expecting that. He doesn’t usually compliment me. That’s not a thing we do. Well. Not a thing we did. I suppose I’ve complimented him several times in the course of editing this book. “Thank you.”

He shrugs again, one shoulder lifting up higher than the other, and scratches at the tabletop.

An uneasy silence settles around us, and I nurse my ale, trying to think of something to say. I like these pub nights. I like when they stretch out and fill an evening where I would have just sat at the flat with Fiona watching shitty television or being bored. I’d never admit it, but sometimes I goad him into arguments just to keep him here, ruddy cheeked and growling and laughing at me.

But now my mind is blank.

Salisbury, the illiterate wonder, is the one who finds a topic.

“Listen, will you be at the next meeting for the television show?” he asks, lowering his voice. “The one next month?”

I frown. The TV show again.

“I still haven’t heard anything about this from anyone but you.” I have a theory about that, which involves Mage.

“Weird. I wonder why Mage hasn’t told you.”

“Because he hates me and wants me to play no role in his success.”

That’s pretty much my entire theory.

Salisbury scoffs and shakes his head, his face scrunched up in disagreement. “Nah, c’mon, he doesn’t hate you.”

“No, he hates me. And I hate him. He’s evil.”

Salisbury’s brow furrows to an alarming degree, and his mouth opens a bit as he squints at me in confusion.

“He’s not evil,” he argues. “He’s a nice guy, you just rub him the wrong way.”

“Well he rubs me the wrong way,” I snap back. The warmth and laughter and comfortable feelings from our earlier argument are gone. This is a real one, and I don’t like it. “He’s an imbecile.”

Salisbury looks ready to growl.

“You know, he told me about the meeting where you shouted at him,” he says, his voice sharpened to an accusing point. “Told me what you called him.”

I bristle. So Mage talks about me behind my back to my authors. Beautiful. How professional. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised — last year I heard that Salisbury had tried to convince Mage to switch him to another editor, but Mage had refused. I suppose they’ve got a nice history of shit talking me in their private meetings.

“It’s not a secret,” I snap back. “Everyone is aware.”

Salisbury is gaping like a fish.

“Why do you always have to be so nasty to people?” he demands. His brows are so furrowed they look like they may merge into one. “What do you get out of it?”

“The satisfaction of making people aware of their idiocy,” I drawl. “At this point it’s the only reason I talk to you.”

Tension and annoyance is thrumming through my stomach, and Salisbury looks enraged. I haven’t seen him this angry since I threw one of the plastic _Sir Scone_ merchandise dragons at him. That used to be a cherished memory. But this? This is giving me no satisfaction.

“Acting so superior all the time isn’t going to make people like you.”

“I don’t want people to like me,” I snap. “What would I get out of that?”

“Oh my _God_ ,” he growls, drawing out the word. “This is what I mean. This is just the same shit you pull with me, and Mage, and everyone. Do you really have to do that?”

“Yes.”

“But why?” he demands, his voice plaintive and forceful. “Why can’t you just get along?”

“Because I don’t want to,” I snap back, reaching behind me for my discarded jacket. “This is my mother’s company, and I refuse to stand by and watch him change it and run it into the ground.”

“Change can be good,” he says, jutting out his jaw. “Change is a good thing. New ideas, new blood.”

“Sometimes change for change’s sake isn’t always wise,” I say, pulling my jacket on.

“You sound like a fucking fortune cookie,” he growls.

“As riveting as this argument is, I have to be going,” I say coldly, standing up. Salisbury looks so angry he’s nearly smoking, and I have an uncomfortable jittery feeling in my stomach from the tension. “Have a nice night, Salisbury.”

I down my ale in one sip and slam the empty back on the table.

“Oh, and you can keep your overwrought sword practise scene.”

“Forget it,” he snarls. “It’s not worth it.”

Usually I insist on having the last word, but not this time. I just turn and leave Salisbury to stew in his own anger, his annoyance radiating off of him like clouds of smoke, and I don’t look back.

 

***

 

_“They’ll kill us if they find us.” The Knight’s voice was fractured and weak, and his fingers gripped tightly to the grass beneath his hands. “They’ll take my sword and drive it through your heart and they’ll drag me back in chains for what we’ve done.”_

_“I won’t let them. I’ll protect you,” the Beast said, whispering his lips across the Knight’s hair. “I’ll fight any army they send. I’ll break them and drink in their blood as they bash themselves against my fortress wall.”_

_The Knight turned his head away, and the Beast’s lips trailed down his neck._

_“No one has fought for me before,” the Knight whispered._

_“I’d fight everyone for you.”_

_The Knight turned to look at the Beast. He took in his dark eyes, his long nose, his blood red lips. They’d both been stained by blood. They’d both been drenched in it until it had soaked through and coloured their skin and hair and bones. Their hearts were dripping in it._

_“You won’t have to. I won’t make you a monster.”_

_The Beast looked away, but not before the Knight saw the flash of burning grief and despair in his eyes._

_“I’m a Beast. I’m the thing of their nightmares.”_

_“No, you’re not.” The Knight took the Beast’s knuckles and raised them to his lips, kissing each one softly. “I don’t think you’ve ever been a beast. Not really.”_


	6. Chapter 6

I hate Mondays.

Saying that makes me sound like some kind of jaded fascist cartoon cat, and yet. I fucking hate Mondays.

My head is still splitting from this past weekend. Dev and Niall tried to cram a whole month’s worth of missed wine and curry nights into two days, and my head and my stomach are both revolting against me, and even worse, Dev looks completely fine.

He also beat me to the Tube stop this morning, which he never does. I’m always the one who makes it in early enough to grab a coffee while I wait for him so we can walk the rest of the way to work together. But this morning he’s the one waiting on the other side of the Oyster machines, holding his latte and smiling while I struggle to function like a human.

“You watching the match tonight?” he asks. His voice is so loud.

“No, I’m going to drown myself.”

“Can I watch? Niall begged off our plans.”

“No.”

Dev takes a sip of his coffee and sighs as we make our way through the tunnel toward the exit.

“Still being a little bitch, then? Still not going to tell me what happened?”

“Nothing happened,” I snap, squinting as the sun comes into view. “Fuck off.”

“Baz!”

Dev pulls up short at the sound of my name from behind us, and I sigh. God, please no.

Wellbelove appears at my elbow, bright and blonde and perky and toting a fluorescent pink iced drink, which she salutes Dev with.

“Happy Monday! You two have good weekends?”

“Great,” Dev says, grinning. “Baz didn’t though. He was just about to tell me why he’s acting like his cat pissed in his coffee.”

“I haven’t had coffee,” I snarl, trudging ahead of them as we hit the stairs.

“He’s been pissy all weekend,” Dev whispers to Wellbelove.

“Maybe it’s the _Sir Scone_ meeting today,” she answers, not bothering to lower her voice and pretend like I’m not right here. “The team has a big meeting this morning with Simon to go over the art designs.”

“Oh, well that would do it,” Dev says reasonably. “He hates Salisbury.”

“I don’t _hate_ Salisbury,” I snap, slowing a bit. Not so they can catch up with me, but because my head is spinning and it’s hot as fuck out here, and I possibly was not prepared for walking in the heat with a hangover and a stomach full of curry.

And it’s true, I don’t hate him. I’m just pissed at him and don’t want to see him and rehash our stupid argument about my shining personality which ruined my otherwise lovely Friday night.

I went back to my flat and bitched at Fiona, who did not respond or care, because that’s just who Fiona is, and I spent the whole evening feeling stupid and like I’d lost my mind.

Maybe this entire project — this entire idea of working with Salisbury — is some extended mania left from my three months stuck inside my flat during my suspension. Maybe it’s my masochistic tendencies rearing their heads in full force and setting me on a path of pain and lunacy.

“What are you talking about?” Dev asks. “Everyone knows you hate his books.”

“I never said that,” I argue quickly, which might be a lie. I might have said that. “It’s just… well, I’ve always thought it was a waste.”

“A waste?” Wellbelove asks.

It occurs to me that no one has ever asked me why I feel so strongly about these books. Since I started working on this new project, I haven’t been bitching about them as much, but my fight with Salisbury is still fresh and bubbling under my skin, and I get that swell of excitement that coincides with getting to be petty about someone that’s pissed me off.

“Salisbury cranks out dozens of these books and they sell well, but there’s so much effort put into promoting them, effort that isn’t given to other books,” I explain, pitching my voice down as Dev holds open the door to Pitch Publishing. “They’ve almost become the entire Pitch Publishing brand, even though our children’s imprint is small. And on a personal level, I dislike wasting my time and energy on a children’s book. It’s not my expertise and it’s not what I studied for.”

“But it’s more than a children’s book,” Wellbelove argues, tapping the button for the lift. “They’re really quite good.”

“Really?” I drawl, raising an eyebrow. Maybe I’d be more generous toward _Sir Scone_ if Salisbury hadn’t been such an absolute pillock. But right now everything involving that stupid knight and his dragons and _Mage_ makes me want to seethe.

“They always make me happy, don’t you think?” Wellbelove continues, either missing or ignoring my sarcasm. “They’re just so… optimistic. _Sir Scone_ always keeps going, always keeps fighting, even against all odds. And he’s just so nice. I wish I could see the world the way Simon must.” She pauses for a second. “I guess it would just be nice to be that committed and sure of something.”

The lift dings open and she and Dev file in, and it takes me a beat to follow.

“Hm,” I say, suddenly uncomfortable. I don’t want to talk about this anymore. I don’t want to think about Salisbury’s earnest goodness or his endearing optimism. “Say, Wellbelove, while I have you. I’ve a new book and I’m trying to source an artist for it. Would you be interested?”

Wellbelove wrinkles her nose. Even with her face scrunched up like a pug she’s a shockingly attractive woman, if you’re into women.

“Is it another horror? Because no offence, but I don’t love doing those creepy black covers, it’s just not my preference.”

Dev snorts.

“Not a horror. Another fantasy. But it’s good. I can send you the manuscript if you want?”

Wellbelove shrugs and takes a long sip of her pink drink as the lift doors open on the fourth floor.

“Sure. I’m about to have some space.” She smiles at me. “See you in ten for the meeting?”

The doors close behind her before I can answer, and Dev sighs.

“She is unfairly attractive, don’t you think?” he asks. I shake my head.

“No.”

We’re silent for the rest of the trip up and I can’t stop thinking over how much I don’t want today. Salisbury will be here soon, and I’ll have to deal with that. And I don’t want to.

Not in the way that I never want to edit his stupid children’s books or deal with his babbles or answer his constant emails. It’s not because I find him annoying and we hate each other.

It’s because I don’t find him annoying, and I rather don’t hate him.

It would be easier if I did, but I don’t. And this odd little truce we’ve been working with has tipped me off balance. There was a small comfort in being tipped — an enjoyability, like when you’ve had a few too many drinks and you’re not drunk but you’re in that floating, buzzed space between. It was nice.

And then Friday night tipped me again. I got splashed back into sobriety, and now I’m hungover and ashamed and even though my feet are firmly planted on solid ground I still have vertigo.

The lift doors open onto my bustling floor and I take deep breaths, pulling in the familiar smells and trying to steady myself. Everything about this is ridiculous. I’m ridiculous. I just need to get the fuck on with it.

“Come over for the match tonight,” I mutter to Dev. “Just don’t bring curry.”

Dev claps me on the back as I break off, and it helps. I’m fine. This tension and annoyance I’m feeling is unreasonable, and as I round the corner toward my office, I’m feeling better.

Until I notice my office door is open.

To my immense surprise, sitting inside is Simon Salisbury. I glance at my watch. He’s early. And not in the conference room.

He’s early, and he broke into my office.

With coffee.

“Hey!” he says, giving me an absolutely blinding smile. “It’s fucking hot outside. I brought iced coffee.” He holds up two cups. One black, one swimming with whipped cream. “I had them make your weird thing iced.”

He hands it to me, his smile still fixed on his face, and I stare at it.

There’s a scene in _Slain_ that’s just like this. The Knight insults the Beast; he stomps off to his tower and fumes for almost a week before the Knight appears at his door with food.

They eat on the floor of the tower, and the Knight tells the Beast about his childhood with the King, and the Beast teaches the Knight the names of the stars.

 _“A peace offering,”_ the Knight says.

That’s what this is, I suppose. An offering in the form of a three-hundred calorie iced coffee.

The longer I stare at the coffee, the more Salisbury’s smile slips, until eventually he looks fuming.

“Look, I only took one sip,” he mutters. “I was just curious. How the fuck could you tell?”

I couldn’t. But his confession soothes me. Smoothes me. Tips me just back off the edge into that comfortable area of the unknown, and I take the coffee from him with the barest, quickest of smiles, and take a long sip.

My headache eases and my stomach calms, and life suddenly seems less bleak.

“Come on, Salisbury. We’ve got business to attend to.”

 

***

 

    _The Knight sat back and wiped his hands. The small plot of earth had been cleared enough to plant the seeds and set up the small garden. There were still tiny rocks in the dirt though, and some weeds had escaped, but it was satisfactory, at the least, and it was honest work. Real work. Work that didn’t involve blood and a sword. Just him, a man, on his knees with the sun and the earth._

_“You’ve left in the roots,” came the Beast’s voice from behind him. He was standing in the shade of the tall oak that grew in the heart of the keep, his black robes falling around him like shadows. “Anything you plant will be choked by them.”_

_“How can you tell?” the Knight asked, squinting. He still felt uneasy in the Beast’s presence, still unsure. But he’d agreed to stay and work on breaking the curse; he had to trust the Beast to keep his word._

_“You can feel them,” the Beast said. “Can’t you?”_

_The Knight couldn’t. He plunged his fingers back into the cool, damp soil, but he felt nothing._

_“You’re doing it wrong,” the Beast sighed. He still didn’t move from the shade._

_“Then you do it,” the Knight growled, sitting back on his heels. “Don’t just stand there and lurk.”_

_The Beast watched him for a moment, and the Knight expected him to turn and flee back up to his tower. But instead he took off his dark robes, rolled up the sleeves of his white tunic, and stepped out of the shade._

_He knelt in the dirt next to the Knight and plunged his long fingers into the earth._

_“Give me your hand,” he commanded. “And I’ll show you.”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to @carryonsimoncarryonbaz for your lovely beta reading!!


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Plot? What’s this?

“I give in.” Dev announces from my doorway. “Your book has made me gay.”

My eyes are locked to my computer screen where Salisbury is still typing away, writing me a fucking novel in our chat about the latest _Game of Thrones_ episode.

 

 **SS:** It’s just people say the books are better because there’s more detail but you can’t really compare them? I think the television show is so much better because it can, you know, take risks.

 **BP:** _You’re really saying it’s better? Still?_

 **SS:** just fucking hold on im getting there

 **SS:** like, you read the books for the battles, right? But that’s where the show is so much better. Why read for the sword fights when you can SEE them?

 **SS:** so then when you do just such a bad job at the battles, which is the thing the show does best?? Just why bother if you can’t even get the fighting right. That’s why people watch.

 **BP:** _I think more people watch for the sex, tbh._

 

I tear my eyes away from the chat as Dev’s words catch up with me, and I look up. He’s leant against the doorframe, his hands in his pockets, a shit eating grin on his face.

“What book?”

“The slag dragon book,” he says, entering the office and collapsing in my chair. “Your new one. It’s made me gay.”

“Slag dragon?”

Dev shrugs and toys with the miniature _Sir Scone_ dragon on my desk. It’s the only piece of _Sir Scone_ paraphernalia I have, and it’s only because I once threw it at Salisbury’s head during a meeting and I still treasure the memory.

“That’s what everyone is calling it,” Dev says. “Pretty much everyone has read it.”

Fear strikes through my chest, followed by a small tendril of excitement. People are reading the book. People are interested.

“How?” I ask. “Who’s handing it out?”

“Agatha.”

 

 **SS:** What? No way. People watch for the fighting.

 **SS:** And the characters.

 **BP:** _Dev has just informed me that everyone is calling your book ‘the slag dragon book’_

 

“Why is Agatha handing it out? Why is everyone reading it?”

Dev raises an eyebrow and stares at me like I’m stupid. I don’t enjoy it. I’m the one who gives those looks.

“Because it’s great? It’s like _Game of Thrones_ meets _Sir Scone_. Like if _Sir Scone_ had an identity crisis, found out he was gay, and then got it on with one of the dragons.”

“The Beast isn’t actually a dragon,” I snap. “At no point in the entire book is there dragon sex.”

“But a man can dream,” Dev says wistfully, waving his hand in the air. “Anyway, it’s brilliant. Dunno where you found this Snow bloke, but he’s incredible. Niall cried at the garden scene.”

“You gave it to Niall?”

Dev shrugs and fiddles with his shoelace.

“He wanted to read it. He won’t blab, I give him galleys all the time.”

I have a lot of theories about what else Dev gives Niall all the time, but I don’t mention it. I’m not entirely positive that Slag Dragon was the first thing to open my cousin’s eyes to the appeals of men.

 

 **SS:** he’s not a dragon!

 **SS:** and he’s not a slag!

 

I click out of Salisbury’s chat. He’s too distracting, and when he gets going he doesn’t stop. He is not afraid to send sixteen messages in a row, as I know well.

“So you mean to say that this is spreading through Pitch Publishing?”

Dev nods.

“Yup. You’re turning heads, mate. This was a bold pick. It’s brilliant, though. Mage is going to lose his mind. God, and can you imagine the look on Salisbury’s face when he finds out? You should send him a proof and ask him to blurb it.”

I can’t stop the smile that’s growing across my face.

“And people like it?”

“Yes,” Dev repeats, frowning. “Why are you so invested in this? You don’t care about your other books this much.”

I shrug, and then inwardly cringe. What a Simon move. He’s wearing off on me; I never shrug.

“Call it emotional attachment. I rather like the Beast.”

“Of course you would,” Dev scoffs, throwing the tiny dragon up in the air and catching it. “You’re the same fucking person.”

“What?”

“You and The Beast. You’re the same person,” Dev says. “You’ve got that same broody personality and shitty sense of humour and flair for the dramatic. If the Beast wore Wayfarers and drank overpriced coffee his name would literally be Baz Pitch.”

I sit up straighter at my desk. That’s ridiculous. The Beast and I are nothing alike. That’s absurd.

“No, it wouldn’t. The Beast and I are extremely different. He’s a monster.”

“Anddddd that’s my cue to leave,” Dev says, bracing his hands on his knees and standing up. “Really though, great find.”

“Hey, Dev, wait.” I glare at my computer and then back to him. “Do you watch _Game of Thrones_ for the battles, characters, or sex?”

He grins a disgusting, horrible grin.

“Oh, definitely for the tits.”

 

***

   

I played football in uni and run on a regular basis, and yet not even my speed was able to get me around the corner before Mage saw me.

“Basilton, a word?”

I close my eyes and cringe, slowing my pace and coming to a stop in the middle of the hallway as I wait for Mage to catch up with me. He walks slowly, his hands in the pockets of that stupid green suit he wears every day, that falsely kind expression on his face.

“Sir,” I nod, gritting the words out. He nods back.

“I’ve been hearing quite a lot about your new book,” he says, a shitty, patronising smile plastered on. “I hope you don’t mind but I took the liberty of reviewing your proofs, as I was curious.”

I smash down the mental image of Mage reading through Salisbury’s romantic prose and tender sex scenes. No need to spoil the book for myself.

“Good, isn’t it? I’m rather fond of it.”

“It’s interesting,” Mage says, still smiling. It looks more insincere by the moment. “It felt very familiar. Don’t you think it runs a bit too close to the _Sir Scone_ books?”

“Aside from featuring knights, I can’t see any similarities,” I lie. “Salisbury doesn’t own the whole medieval genre.”

“I’m not talking about the knights,” Mage says, his voice getting sharper, but the smile never leaving. It’s an unsettling combination. “There’s some similarity of feeling there. Don’t you feel it? Almost as if the writer was acutely familiar with _Sir Scone_ and took great lengths to avoid _any_ overlap.”

“I’m not sure I follow.”

That’s a lie. I follow perfectly. And he’s right: that’s exactly what I did. I went through and made Salisbury wipe out anything that could even remotely be tied to _Sir Scone_ or which felt like a familiar phrase. I purged cartoon dragons and friendly knights from the whole work.

“I would just hate to think we might be giving a platform to someone who is deliberately trying to… pervert a beloved children’s series,” Mage says. “We wouldn’t want someone who… doesn’t like _Sir Scone_ as part of the Pitch Publishing family, would we?”

He narrows his eyes and coughs and the meaning of his words hits me.

This fucker actually thinks _I_ wrote Slag Dragon, just to fuck with him. God, I wish. If I’d had there would be about sixty per cent more penises.

Before I can respond, the Mage keeps going.

“I’d like you to set up a meeting with this Snow fellow for tomorrow, so we can chat.”

“Tomorrow?” I say, desperately trying to keep concern and surprise off my face and out of my voice. “He’s not local, sir.”

“We’ll expense his trip. I’m sure he’ll understand how important this is for his book’s future. See to it.” He claps me on the shoulder and his hand digs into my skin for a moment before he lets go. “Good day, Mr. Pitch.”

He walks away and I stare after him, gaping like a fucking fish. When I regain my senses I grapple for my phone to text Salisbury.

 

 **BP:** _Costa. ASAP._

 

***

 

“What if we tell him I died?”

“Then there is no book.”

“What if I just go? Like what if we just tell him the truth?”

I pull at my hair. Actually, literally pull at my hair like I’m a cartoon character, but this is what Simon Salisbury does to me.

“Really?” I ask. “Really?”

Salisbury shrugs and plays with the lip of his cardboard coffee mug. He looks about as strung out as I feel. But at least I’m attempting to fix the situation, instead of blowing it up and going with the option most likely to get me fired.

“Well you don’t have a better idea, do you?” he snaps.

“We put in a ringer.” I lean back in my chair and cross my arms, waiting for his response.

“A what?”

“A ringer.” I pinch the bridge of my nose, glance around, and then lean forward. “We get someone to pretend to be Oliver Snow.”

Salisbury starts shaking his head immediately, his jaw already working itself into a full strop, his curls going everywhere.

“Baz, I dunno, that seems like a lot of work,” he says, his voice tight. “And that’s a full on lie. It’s one thing to use a pen name, but this? This feels odd.”

Fuck Salisbury and his fucking moral compass. I should have known I could only push him too far.

“Fine,” I snap. “Then we bring you in, see how Mage reacts, shall we? Let him decide if this book can continue.”

It’s the worst option. I can tell he knows this, because his whole demeanour has drooped, and he’s staring down at the table and scratching at the plastic top like he does when he’s thinking and nervous.

“Maybe we shouldn’t continue,” he says finally. Very, very quietly. “It seems like it’ll be a lot of stress and cause problems.” He pauses and finally looks up, and his blue eyes look so startling sad that it’s like being stabbed through the heart with a sword. “And, you know, I wrote it. That was enough. I doesn’t have to be published.”

Absolutely fucking not. I will not sit here and watch Salisbury throw away the best thing he’s ever written — the most _important_ thing he’s ever written — because Mage is a homophobic bully.

“Salisbury. Do you want to spend the rest of your life writing children’s drivel?”

“ _Sir Scone_ isn’t—”

“Yes or no,” I interrupt. My voice is calm and level, but I try to keep a biting touch to it. I don’t think he’d believe me if I were suddenly calm and soft. “Do you want Mage and his expectations to box you in? Do you want to spend the rest of your career writing some variation of this over and over, and never be allowed to expand or grow or change?” I stare into his eyes as I lean forward across the table. “Do you want to spend your whole life telling the same story you came up with when you were eighteen?”

He’s silent, but he doesn’t look away from my eyes. For once I can’t tell what he’s thinking. I can’t watch the process of his jaw clenching and his Adam’s Apple bobbing, because I won’t break our eye contact. And in the oddest turn of events, Salisbury’s eyes don’t give anything away. They’re impossible to read.

He breaks contact first, flicking his eyes down to his coffee as he leans back.

“Where are we going to find someone by tomorrow?”

My stomach swoops in victory as I lean back in my chair as well. I don’t even try to hide my smile.

“I was thinking of the American,” I say. “The confusing friendly one.”

“Who?” he frowns.

“The fit one, with the hair.”

He scrunches up his face and stares at me, shaking his head.

“I have no idea who you’re talking about. The only American I know is Penny’s fiance Micah.”

“Yes! That one.” I’ve only met Micah a handful of times, but even I enjoyed him. He has that same endearing bumbling energy that Salisbury has, but none of his temper. Also his hair always looks perfect in a scruffy way, and I’ve no idea how he does it. I suspect it might actually be natural, which makes me hate him a bit.

“Wouldn’t it be better to find a stranger?” Salisbury says, his enthusiasm already waning.

“Maybe, but we don’t have the time for that,” I say, waving my hand. Now that we’re making progress, the tension I’ve been carrying is starting to ease a bit. This is where I’m comfortable: having a plan. “Micah is friendly, charming, and comfortable in any situation. He’s perfect.”

“You really think he’s fit?”

I pause in the middle of taking a sip of my coffee.

“Don’t you?”

Salisbury shrugs. “Fine.” I notice that he hasn’t answered the question, but I’m smug and I’ve just won this battle, so I let it go. “But you text Pen,” he says quickly, pointing a stubby finger at me. “I’m not taking the heat for this.”

Draining my coffee, I pull my shades back on and stand.

“The things I do for you, Salisbury.”

 


	8. Chapter 8

_The Knight crept through the dusk dark grounds, making his way toward the Weeping Tower. He loved this tower; his whole childhood, it had been where he had seen the King, where they had held their lessons, where all his good memories had been made._

_How different it was from the Beast’s tower, with its tidy circular walls and its attic room where he and the Beast had fought and argued and pushed each other to the brink._

_The palace grounds were silent, but he kept close to the wall, his senses alert and ready for battle. No one would question why he was there, but he didn’t want to be seen. Not now. Not when he was so close._

_His heart was pounding. His stomach felt sick. He still, when he closed his eyes, couldn’t believe it. What the King had done. The blood that had won him his crown, the lives he’d sent the Knight to cut down to protect it._

_The price the Beast had paid for it all._

_The Knight closed his eyes, tightened his grip on the sword, and breathed deep._

_All would be rectified, soon. He would break the curse. He would bring back the King’s sword to the Beast. He would put things right, even if it killed him. Even if it turned his world upside down. The Beast had told him not to return, but that didn’t matter. Not now. Not now that he knew the truth._

_“I would choose you everytime,” the Beast had told him the night before he’d left. The Beast had held him tight and whispered the words against his skin. “I choose you.”_

_The Knight unsheathed his sword._

_He’d made his choice as well._

 

***

 

 **SS:** is he there yet?

 **SS:** did it work?

 **BP:** _Calm down and stop blowing up my phone._

 **SS:** this was an awful idea

 **SS:** why the fuck did i let you do this

 **BP:** _Calm down and shut up._

 

“Oi, is he here yet?”

I shove my phone back in my pocket and glare up at Dev, who is lurking in the doorway. His hair has been styled into some kind of artful swooping look, and he’s wearing the cream jumper I gave him last year because it looks good against our skin tone.

This is Dev’s pulling look. Christ. I don’t have time to deal with this.

“No, he’s not,” I sigh, glancing at the clock. Bunce and the American are running late, and it’s making me anxious, but Dev doesn’t need to know that. “Are you just going to loitre in my doorway until he gets here?”

“Yeah, pretty much,” Dev responds, nodding. “What does he look like? Is he fit?”

Yes. Oliver Snow is outrageously fit.

“Why are you so invested in this?” I ask, standing up to collect my paperwork. My mobile buzzes in my pocket three times, and I instinctively reach for it. I don’t know why I bother to pull it out. I know who it will be. Only two people ever text me, and one of them is in this office.

 

 **SS:** just let me know what’s going on

 **SS:** i wish i could have come

 **SS:** i’m so nervous that im sweaty. like my back is actually sweating

 **SS:** i dont think my back has ever sweat

 **BP:** _hot._

 

“Is that him?” Dev asks, stepping into the office to peer over my shoulder. “Is he here?”

“No, it was Salisbury,” I snap, shoving my mobile back in my pocket and away from Dev’s eyes. “Snow will get here when he gets here, stop being so fucking thirsty.”

“I’m not _thirsty_ ,” Dev argues. “And why are you texting Salisbury? What’s up with that?”

“We text,” I hedge, busying myself with papers that don’t need tidying. The closer we get to this plan, the more anxious I’m starting to feel. This is ridiculous. I’ll bluff my way through it, but even I can acknowledge what we’re about to do is insane and unprofessional and seven layers of weird.

Thank God Salisbury is stupid enough to go along.

“Since when?” Dev needles suspiciously.

“Nothing is going to happen with you and Oliver Snow, by the way,” I say, aiming for a distraction.

“What do you and Salisbury text about?”

“Things, Dev, things.”

“What kind of things?”

Things like catfishing Mage and how awful _Game of Thrones_ is lately and sometimes pictures of what Salisbury is making for dinner and occasionally even arguments about football matches. Though less of those lately, because we’ve taken to watching matches together at his local, but sometimes we send funny screencaps of tweets about the matches the day after.

“I have to meet Mage in the large conference room, if you don’t mind,” I snap, gathering my coffee and folders and edging past him.

“Can I sit in?”

An annoyed huff bursts out of me, and I push my hair back out of my face. I may have been slightly, uncharacteristically anxious about how today was going to go, and forgot to style my hair back. It’s been in my eyes all day and I’m close to marching down to the fourth floor and asking Wellbelove for a hair tie.

“Why on earth would you sit in?”

Dev shrugs.

“You could pretend I worked on it with you. Or that I’m, uh, here for… support?”

“Why are you so thirsty for Snow?” I ask, squinting. “What about your thing with Niall?”

Dev’s back goes rigid and he steps away from me.

“What thing with Niall? What are you talking about?” My phone buzzes. “What the actual fuck is Salisbury texting you so much for?”

 

 **SS:** PENNY SAYS THEY ARE WALKING IN

 **SS:** fuck i might be sick

 

I glance at my mobile and sigh.

“They’re here. If I introduce you, will you leave me alone?”

Dev nods like a fucking bobble head. His perfectly styled hair doesn’t move. He must have fucking shellacked it to his head this morning.

“Fine. Come along.”

 

***

 

Mage isn’t in the large conference room when I get there, but Penelope Bunce is. Her hair is back to brown these days, and even years out of school it feels odd not to see a towering mass of green or red or purple curls. Whenever we see each other I still expect to see her coming at me with some clipboard or flyer. My fight or flight instincts always seem to kick in around her: run for my life, or she’ll rope me into some bleeding heart social cause.

“Basilton,” she says in a tight voice. “Nice to see you.”

“Bunce,” I say, arching an eyebrow. “Pleasure as always. Thanks for making this work.” The whole thing feels revolting. For Bunce and I, this is akin to a declaration of love.

Next to Bunce is her fit American. He’s all thin lines, towering above her with his gangly limbs and swoopy hair. He has these deliciously full eyebrows that I’ve always been envious of, and he hides them behind his ridiculous thick square frames.

How Salisbury doesn’t find him fit is beyond me. The man is blind. Or still too newly gay to recognise art when he sees it.

“Baz, great to see you again,” he says, reaching out his hand with an eager, crooked smile. His voice is that kind of imperceptibly flat American accent that I can never place, but it’s pleasant to listen to. Everything about the American reminds me a bit of an overly friendly, tall hound.

“You too, Snow.” I suppose it’s a good thing I never bothered to learn his last name, or else this would be more difficult for me. As it is it’s a bit weird. Snow is Salisbury. Salisbury is Snow. The American may be fit and charming, but I’ve developed a pit of a Pavlovian emotional response to the name Snow, and the American absolutely does not elicit that.

There’s a cough from behind me and an elbow in my back, and I step aside to reveal Dev.

“Bunce, Snow, this is my cousin, Dev,” I say, shaking off my musings. “He’s an editor here as well. He’s given me a rave review of the book.”

Dev sticks his hand out eagerly. He’s shorter than Micah by a decent amount, and has to look up to meet his eyes. Dev doesn’t seem to mind though. He’s raising one eyebrow and flashing a look that I recognise from many, many nights out when he’s been trying to pull girls out of his league.

If I could die of secondhand embarrassment, I would.

“Nice to meet you, Oliver. Loved your book.”

“Oh, thanks so much,” Micah says, smiling. He has perfect, American teeth. I glance at Bunce. Where did she find him? They got together our final year of uni, but I’ve never cared enough to ask for the backstory. “I really appreciate—”

Micah is cut off mid sentence by the door to the conference room swinging open as Mage shoulders it open while staring at his mobile.

“Well, Basilton, was our guest able to make it in—” he looks up, smiling, and then freezes as his eyes land on Micah. He pauses for a beat, then lowers his phone.

“Mr. Mage,” I say, cutting between Dev and Micah. “This is our author, Oliver Snow. Snow, this is Davy Mage. He was very eager to meet you.”

“Great to meet you, Mr. Mage,” Micah booms, practically leaping toward Mage with a smile and a hand. “Thanks so much for taking an interest in my book.”

Mage stares between Micah and I for several seconds.

“You’re Oliver Snow.”

It’s not a question, but Micah nods anyway. Mage shakes his hand slowly, his eyes darting between Micah and I.

“Why does your contract have all payments routed through Penelope Bunce?”

I did not expect Mage to have checked the contract, but I’m glad that I am who I am and have never let a detail go unnoticed in my life.

“Because Oliver Snow is a pen name,” Micah says, just like I instructed. “I thought it was easier to have everything set up through my agent.”

“Why don’t you want your real name involved?” Mage presses. Dev’s head is bobbling between Mage and Micah, but Micah looks unphased.

“Well, sir. You’ve read it. Books like this usually get pen names.” Micah smiles an infuriatingly adorable smile and tilts his head to the side. “It’s privacy reasons, really. Is that a problem?”

“What is your name?”

“Micah Hernandez.”

“How did you pick your pen name?” Mage is firing off question after question, his eyes narrowing into slits as Dev’s eyes grow wider and wider. Bunce is motionless. If she’s feeling as terrified as I am, she’s not letting on. The woman’s made of fucking iron.

“Well I love the movie _Oliver & Company_,” Micah begins.

“I meant Snow. How did you pick Snow?”

Micah blinks, but his face doesn’t change. My stomach churns. I didn’t give him an answer to this one. I didn’t expect it. I genuinely did not think the Mage was going to go this in depth with his questioning once he saw a real person. I think I’ve underestimated just how suspicious he was of _Slain_.

There’s a beat of silence in which I feel like I’m about to die and I wonder if Bunce is about to stab me in the heart, but then the American smiles.

“Micah means snow in Peruvian.”

I am ten thousand per cent positive that is absolutely one hundred per cent not true, and also that Peruvian is not a real language. But Mage doesn’t seem to be as sure, because he’s not calling Micah out.

Maybe it’s because the American looks so damn _confident_. And not in a brash way. Just in an even, unphazed, happy way, like the kind of man who would never tell such an outlandish lie straight to your face.

“Are you aware that Simon Salisbury’s middle name is Snow?” Mage asks, clearing his throat. He seems to have recovered some of his balance. “There are a lot of similarities between your books, young man.”

My stomach drops to my fucking feet. Salisbury’s middle name is _Snow_? First off, that’s fucking precious, and secondly, he’s a huge fucking idiot. He wanted to publish under Simon Snow.

Jesus, the man is a buffoon.

“Sorry,” Micah says, a puzzled expression taking over his tanned face and making his smile droop. “I don’t know who that is. What does he write?”

Mage looks at me, his eyes scanning my face as he searches for some proof that this is a lie, _something._ But I’m impassive. None of us have even sat down yet, we’re just standing around, staring at each other. I put on the bored, dismissive look I wear whenever talking about Salisbury.

“Simon Salisbury is one of my other clients,” I say to Micah. “He’s the one I mentioned during editing. The children’s series I didn’t want _Slain_ to be too similar to. Bunce works with him as well. He’s very,” I stop and let an Alan Rickman-worthy pause hang, “popular around here.”

“Oh!” Micah says, all good humour and smiles. “What a coincidence. Funny how that works, eh?”

He smiles at Mage, unleashing the full and awesome power of American dentistry, and Mage crumbles.

“Well. Nice to meet you, Michael. I’m afraid I have to cut our meeting short. Mr. Pitch, be sure his financials are taken care of.”

He exits the conference room quickly, already pulling out his mobile as the door shuts behind him and everyone but Dev lets out a breath of relief.

“Well that went swimmingly,” I say. Bunce is already shaking her head.

“Too far, Baz. Too far,” she scolds. She reminds me of my father right now, and it’s sending chills down my spine. “I cannot believe I let you drag me into this. I have no idea how you convinced Simon. This is childish and theatrical, even for you.”

“No, come on, babe,” Micah says, wrapping an arm around Bunce’s waist and smiling at her like she hung the moon. “It’s fun! This was fun!”

“This is not fun,” Bunce says, rounding on the American. “This is insane! This is some kind of elaborate hijinx, and it could seriously damage Simon’s career.”

“But you love a good hijinx,” Micah says, still smiling.

“Sorry,” Dev says, staring, “but what is going on?”

My pocket erupts in a seizure of buzzes.

“That’s Salisbury,” I mumble, reaching for my phone.

“Baz—” Dev starts, but I hold up a hand as I answer.

“What do you want, Simon?”

_“Did it work?”_

“Yes, it did,” I sigh, rolling my eyes. Bunce is cutting open my chest cavity and tying my organs together with her eyes, and Dev looks like he’s seen a ghost. Micah is inspecting the mints in the bowl on the table. “By the way, why the actual fuck didn’t you tell me your middle name is Snow?”

Silence on the other end.

_“Uh. Well. I thought you knew.”_

“Why would I know your middle name?”

_“It’s on my contract. And anyway, I know yours.”_

“Of course you know mine,” I snap. “I go by my middle name.”

More silence.

_“Well. Whatever. Hey, ask Pen if she wants to get dinner.”_

“I’m not your fucking secretary.”

_“Just ask her.”_

I pull my phone away from my face and sigh.

“Salisbury wants to know if you want to get dinner,” I say to Bunce and Micah, trying to sound as thoroughly put out as possible. I’m not sure that I’m succeeding, because to be honest I’m so bloody relieved that this actually worked that my powers of drama may have left me temporarily.

“Oooh, yes! Let’s go to that place near his house!” Bunce says, more animated than I’ve seen her since the time at uni when she tried to forcibly take over the Dean’s office during a student protest.

“Oh is that the place with the fire?” Micah asks, shoving his face into Bunce’s hair. “I love that place. Tell Simon to get us a table and we’ll meet him.”

“What the actual fuck,” Dev whispers. I ignore him.

“Get a table at the place with the fire and we’ll meet you,” I tell Salisbury. Dev’s eyes are popping out. “Wait — Dev, do you want to come?”

“I really want to know what the fuck is happening,” Dev says.

“Nevermind, Dev’s out. Just four.”

_“Alright, I’ll head over. Text me when you’re close?”_

“Sure.” I ring off without saying goodbye and turn back to Bunce and Micah as I glance at my watch.

“It’s just about five. Want to head out now? I’m done for the day.” Dev makes a squeaking noise and I turn back to him. “Dev, I said you could come if you wanted.”

“What in the name of fuck,” he whispers, his eyes wide, “is happening?”

I sigh. I should tell him. There’s no point keeping it a secret anymore, he already knows too much.

“Micah here didn’t write _Slain._ Salisbury did. We’ve been working together to publish it under a pen name.”

“Salisbury?” Dev squeaks. “Salisbury wrote that? But it’s — I mean it’s so — and the scene where the Knight and the Beast — oh my god.” He stares at me, his eyes getting wider, until he places both his hands on my shoulders. “Oh. My. God.”

I nod.

“Trust me, I know.”

“And the Beast?”

“What about him?” I ask. Dev’s eyes flick between me and Bunce.

“Come on,” Dev says. “I mean. The Beast. _The Beast._ ” I raise an eyebrow.

“You’re speaking gibberish.”

Bunce snorts, and Dev nods emphatically.

“Yes!” he shouts, looking at Bunce. “Thank you! The Beast!” He does this odd little flourish with his hands, and Bunce sighs.

“I know,” she says, giving Dev a tight, unhappy smile. “Trust me, I know. The Beast.”

I have no idea what they’re talking about, which makes me extremely annoyed. I hate being left out of the loop, and I don’t think I’m going to get an answer from either of them. At least Micah looks pleasantly confused as well, so I’m not the only one who isn’t following.

“Can we go, please?” I snap. “Unless you two want to keep babbling?”

Bunce is hiding a shitty grin, but she nods.

“Of course,” she says. “Lead the way.”

Micah claps Dev on the back politely and Bunce gives him a tiny nod as they go to follow me out of the conference room. From behind me, I can still hear Dev talking to himself.

“The fucking _Beast_.”


	9. Chapter 9

“So when do I get to read this thing?” Micah asks, running his hand over the firepit in the middle of our table. I restrain my impulse to smack his hand away, but thankfully Bunce doesn’t.

“Don’t play with fire,” she chides, scooting closer to him. “And you can read it when it’s done.”

“Wait, you haven’t read it?” I ask, putting down my wine. My arm jostles against Salisbury’s as I do so, and he elbows me back gently. “How have you not read it?”

“It’s not finished,” Micah says, frowning. “No one reads it until it’s finished…. Right?”

“I think literally everyone at Pitch Publishing has read it by now,” I say, snorting. “I didn’t know there was anyone left in this group who hadn’t.”

“People at Pitch only read it because of the slag dragon thing,” Salisbury mumbles into his ale.

“Sorry, what?” Bunce says, perking up. She’s carefully removing onions from her plate and piling them onto Salisbury’s, and he’s been eating them obediently.

“Everyone calls it the Slag Dragon book,” I tell her smugly. Bunce let’s put a high pitched bark of laughter.

“He’s not a dragon, and he’s not a slag,” Salisbury argues, mouth full of onion.

“Wait, why do they call it that?” Micah asks. “I don’t get it. I literally don’t know anything about this book.”

I take another long sip of my wine and then set it back on the table as I meet Micah’s eyes.

“The Knight fucks a dragon.”

Salisbury spits onions across the table and Bunce snorts into her drink. I may possibly have had several too many glasses of wine. Salisbury and Bunce are in their cups as well; only Micah seems to be sober, because he’s American and doesn’t appreciate the joys of casual alcoholism.

“He does not fuck a dragon!” Salisbury shouts, slapping the table. “He’s not a dragon! There is no dragon fucking!”

“Uh, can I get anything else for the table?” our waiter asks in almost a whisper. Bunce shriek cackles into her wine and Salisbury starts to turn purple.

“No, thank you,” Micah says calmly. “We’re good.”

“Another wine for me, please,” I say, holding up my almost empty glass. I should slow down, but I don’t want to. I’m happy. I’m comfortable. Everyone at the table is in high spirits, and with each glass of wine I drink and every pint of ale Salisbury downs, we seem to get closer and closer, our shoulders now touching, our knees knocking together occasionally.

He always smells like cinnamon when he drinks. I don’t know what it is that he always orders, but it should be illegal.

“How exactly does dragon sex work?” Micah asks, leaning in and nearly putting his elbow in the fire. Bunce pulls him back quickly. Maybe Micah is more in his cups than I assumed.

“There is no dragon sex,” Bunce says, shaking her head. “Really. Everyone who just talks about the sex is doing the book a disservice. It’s much more than that. It’s really good, Simon.” She smiles and reaches out to place a hand on Salisbury’s, and he absolutely beams at her, the drunken fool. “You wrote something really lovely. I can’t wait to see what you do next.”

“Thanks, Pen,” he says, squeezing her hand before he leans back in the booth. His shoulder settles firmly against mine. “I’m, uh, I’m actually working on a new book.”

“Really?” I ask, my tone sharper and more alert than I intended. “You didn’t tell me.”

“Me neither,” Bunce says, giving him a disapproving look. “What’s it about?

“Is it queer?” I ask.

“Are there dragons?” Micah adds. Salisbury shakes his head and blushes. The ale has made his cheeks ruddy and slap rash red, and his moles stand out even more against the pink skin.

“No dragons! No, it’s, uh, modern.” He glances at me for a moment and then back to Bunce. “Still working out the plot, so I don’t want to give too much but it’s about two blokes who are best friends. Right now it’s kind of following their friendship and conversations and stuff.”

“Oh my God, are they in love?” Micah whispers. Salisbury shrugs.

“I dunno! I guess we’ll see.”

“That’s a yes,” I say smugly, taking a sip of my wine. “They’ll be boning by act three.”

“No,” Salisbury says forcefully. “There’s, uh, no sex in this.”

“Pity,” I say, taking another sip of wine before turning to him. “Whatever. Send it to me when it’s done.”

“Or you could send it to me,” Bunce interrupts. “You know, your agent. And we could find you somewhere to publish it that wouldn’t require elaborate hoaxes involving my fiance.”

“Babe, let me live,” Micah says, reaching an arm around Bunce and pulling her in as the table erupts in laughter.

Across the flickering fire in the middle of our table, they look happy. Content. Wrapped up in one another and confident.

Sometimes I wish I had that. I wish I had the steady warmth of a person next to me. I wish I had the ability to reach out my arm and let it hang on the booth behind me, trapping someone in its circle. I wish I had… someone.

“We should probably head out,” Bunce says, elbowing Micah and covering up a yawn. “We’ve an early morning tomorrow.”

“Oh, shit, yeah,” Micah says, glancing at his watch. “We should get home.”

I wish I didn’t have to always go home alone.

“I’ve got the check,” Salisbury says, struggling for his wallet. He leans into me as he does so, and I get a nose full of cinnamon. “Really, thanks again, guys. It means a lot.”

“Of course, Si,” Bunce says, scooting out of her booth and coming up to drop a kiss to his cheek. “I’m just happy you’re happy.”

I wish I was happy.

Christ, this is why I need to stop drinking. It makes me soft and maudlin and weak.

Bunce and future Mr. Bunce say their goodbyes and leave the restaurant arm-in-arm, and then it’s just Salisbury and me, sitting next to each other in front of a fire.

“Want another round before we hit the road?” he asks quietly, and I nod, eager to draw out the evening and delay my solitary walk home.

“Your first good idea,” I tell him, angling myself so I can look at him more fully. He does the same, turning to his side so we’re almost facing each other in our booth. Cosy, still close. Face to face.

We finish our drinks in companionable silence, broken only by a comment here and there about the book, or the upcoming match, and by the time Salisbury settles the bill and we slide out of the booth, I’m slightly unsteady on my legs.

I’m drunk.

I’m not slurring, stumbling drunk, but I’ve entered that floaty realm where my body does things and I’m just along for the ride, and my brain has taken a night off its neurosis and shut up.

“Which way are you?” Salisbury asks as we step outside the restaurant. “I’m down that way,” he says, gesturing his head. “It’s a nice night, thought I’d walk it instead of the Tube.”

“I’m the same direction,” I say, even though I’m actually not at all sure if I am. “I’ll walk with you.”

We set off down the pavement shoulder to shoulder, our hands each shoved deep in our respective pockets, our pace slow and matched to each other.

“You know,” he says suddenly, and now I realise he _is_ slurring his words a bit, “I never asked how you got started. You’re so young.”

“I’m just that brilliant,” I retort. He huffs his disbelief. “It’s my mother’s company. She started it when she was close to my age. My father is still on the board. I applied for a job out of uni and no one chose to argue. Simple nepotism, really.”

“Of course it is,” Salisbury says, shaking his head in wonder. “Should have figured.” There isn’t a bite to his voice when he says it, though. “Plummy twat.”

“Street urchin,” I respond. Sluggishly. Maybe I’m more drunk that I thought.

I put my hands further in my jacket pockets and focus on following Salisbury’s lead as we make our way through the dusk darkening city, passing over a bridge that I finally recognise.

Salisbury pauses to peer over the bridge, staring off over the city as the lights twinkle back at us and cars drive by. They cause a light wind each time they pass, and it feels good on my wine-flushed skin.

“I grew up right over there,” he says, nodding generally at the skyline. “Well. For a bit.” He’s looking at some building I can’t see, chewing on his lip, totally lost in thought. “I used to sit at that window and make lists of all the things I wasn’t allowed to think about. Then when I was done I’d make lists of things I could think about, things that were impossible, that it couldn’t hurt to want because they weren’t real, like knights and dragons.”

“I loved dragons when I was younger,” I mumble, walking closer to him to look over his shoulder. I still can’t see the building he’s talking about it, but it might be because my eyelids feel heavy. “Full of fire.” I move even closer, until I’m almost touching his back with my chest. He’s so warm.

“Warm,” I mumble, and lean into him.

I didn’t make a conscious decision to do it, but as I lean in, my face comes down to press against his neck.

He leans back into me.

Syrupy warmth is trickling from the base of my skull, down my spine, coiling in my stomach and leaking down to my toes as I let out a low, shaky breath and press my lips against his neck.

“Hmm,” I exhale. I’m drunker than I thought I was, because I can’t control anything that I’m doing. Simon must be shit faced too because he tilts his head away from me to expose more of his neck and then…

He turns his head to lightly nuzzle at my cheek. His eyes are closed. His breathing is uneven, and he’s… lightly pressing his nose against my cheek.

My whole body feels like it’s shaking, and I reach out for him to steady myself, my hands landing on his hips.

We’re standing here, flush together, staring out at the London skyline. My face is in his hair and he’s leaning against me for support and it’s… it’s overwhelming.

It’s like a scene from _Slain._

Uncomfortably, heartbreakingly tender.

I pull back suddenly as the reality of what I’m doing hits me. Simon stumbles slightly as I step away, but I don’t reach out for him.

“You’re just down there, right?” I ask, clearing my throat. He spins and faces me. His eyes are bright.

“Yeah,” he says. His voice is raspy. “Do you want to—”

“Let’s call it a night then? I’m that way.” I point in the opposite direction. I don’t even know if that’s actually the proper way to my flat, but I’m sharp and suddenly sober enough to know I need to leave, right now, before I do something even more humiliating because I’m too drunk to stop myself.

He blinks, long and slow, and then clears his throat as well.

“Er, yeah. Uhm. We still on for the match tomorrow?”

I shove my hands in my pockets and nod. The match. Meeting up at the pub near his house to watch the match together, alone. After I’ve just shoved my face into his neck and sniffed him like a fucking dog. After I’ve just molded myself to his back and held him like I have any right to do so.

I’m becoming more sober by the moment as the horror and reality of what I’ve just done trickles over me like icy dread.

“I made plans with Dev,” I say, my voice sharpening to cut through my wine fog.

He stares at me and nods.

“Oh. Uh. Yeah. Dev, sounds good.”

We stare at each other, not moving. I have to make the first move and turn away. I have to get out of here. I can’t keep standing here, so close, knowing he smells and feels and sounds like that.

“Night, Salisbury.” I turn around so I can’t see him, because I can’t look at him. I can’t look at his moles or his ruddy cheeks or his windswept hair. But I can hear his quiet, slightly slurred voice.

“Goodnight, Baz.”

 

***

 

_There were so many things in life that the Knight had wanted. There were so many things he couldn’t begin to list them. But he didn’t think about those things. Wanting was a weakness. Acknowledging what you didn’t have was useless. It slowed you down. It distracted you. It got you killed._

_The King had told him this since he was young: all he could expect in life were the tools he carried with him. Looking to the future would get him killed. The fight was in the moment._

_But the Knight couldn’t stop thinking about wanting. Wanting and being wanted._

_Not thinking about things didn’t mean he didn’t want them. It didn’t mean they weren’t there, crouched under his skin, waiting to burst out and choke him._

_He closed his eyes and pulled the Beast closer, until they were fully flush. Skin to skin, no space between them, their chests rising and falling with the same breaths. The Beast slept on, and the Knight pressed his puffy eyes to the cool marble of the Beast’s shoulder, and then he unlocked his chest and let himself want._

_He let himself want and feel and fear and love. His body shook with it, and he felt that he would spill over it with it all. It was too much. He held the Beast tighter, pressing his lips to the Beast’s back, and imagined pushing all the overwhelming emotions into him, until the Beast was filled with all the love and want that the Knight had carried alone so long._

_The Knight kissed the Beast’s spine and willed the last of his love through the cold skin. He prayed the Beast would know how to use it._


	10. Chapter 10

“I have a surprise for you.”

Wellbelove is standing all coy and pretty in my doorway, a beam of afternoon light streaming in behind her and framing her head in a hazy halo.

“Please let it be a lobotomy,” I mutter, looking up from the _Slain_ pages I’m proofing. I’ve been trying to get them done all week, and yet every time I sit down to read I just keep thinking about Salisbury, warm and drunk and nuzzling against my cheek, and then my whole body gets washed with terror and humiliation and a suffocating amount of _want_ and I have to step away and work on the serial killer manuscript I’ve just gotten in.

“Unfortunately it is not,” she says, sweeping into my office with a breeze of skirts and floral perfume. She sits down in the chair across from my desk. “It’s art.”

She opens the large pink portfolio she’s carrying.

“I’ve got the cover for _Slain_ , and I wanted to give you a peek at it.”

She pulls out a large, glossy print and passes it over to me, and my stomach does an odd little leap of excitement. I’m not used to this feeling; I don’t normally get excited by updates on my manuscripts. I used to. Every step of the process used to be a thrill. The first time I saw art for the first book I’d ever solo edited, I felt so horrifyingly delighted that I thought I might puke.

The cover is, to put it bluntly, gorgeous. Wellbelove has truly outdone herself with the art; a knight in golden armour, kneeling on the snow, a sword through his chest. His back is arched, as if in pain, and the blood seeps out behind him onto the snow in the shape of dragon wings. A pair of long, pale fingers reach toward him, but their owner is off screen.

“So?” she asks after I’ve stared at it for several moments. “Any edits?”

“Hm?” I ask, tearing my eyes from the bronze curls and freckled skin of the Knight. “No. It’s lovely.”

“Oh, good,” she says, letting out a puff of air. “I was worried about the design on the Knight a bit. Want in on a secret?”

I look away from the cover and place it carefully next to me on my desk.

“Always. Though, fair disclosure, I don’t keep other people’s secrets.”

“Me neither,” she says, waving her hand in the air dismissively. “I based him off of Simon.”

“What?” I choke out, my eyes going wide. “Why?”

She shrugs.

“I always do something like that in my designs. I steal from real people. Sometimes it just fits so well, you know?” She glances at the door. “I use myself as a base for Princess Lucy for the _Sir Scone_ books.”

“You know, now you say it, I’ve always thought the princess reminded me of you,” I say, my eyes flicking back to the cover of _Slain_ , where Simon lays bleeding out in the snow.

“That’s because I did it on purpose,” Wellbelove says smugly.

“No,” I correct, looking back at her. “I mean her personality. In the first book she’s bland and boring. But I noticed that after you started working with Salisbury, the princess really took off and became more developed. Suddenly she was blonde and had your humour and such. I always thought he had written you into it.”

“He probably did,” she says, shrugging. “He steals too. He always does stuff like that.”

“What do you mean? What does he steal?”

I’m not an idiot. I know what she’s going to say. She’s going to confirm the same thing Dev has been babbling on about, the same thing I’ve been spending months convincing myself isn’t true. The thing that’s harder to ignore, now that every time I close my eyes I remember the small humming breath Salisbury exhaled as he turned his face into my on the bridge.

Wellbelove shrugs again.

“His life. He takes a bit of himself and his friends and puts them into the books. They mimic his real life so much, I’m surprised you haven’t noticed. I’m Princess Lucy. Penny is very clearly The Seer. I think Mage may be the Grand Wizard.” She pauses and tilts her head. “Minty and I think it’s funny that you’re pretty much the only person he hasn’t written into his books.”

My heart has suddenly begun to beat very, very hard.

“You know, this is funny, actually,” Wellbelove says, continuing without realising that I’m starting to go into cardiac arrest. I may actually be sweating. I feel suddenly ill. “Minty and I were just talking about _Slain_ before I came up here, and she thinks the Beast is so much like you.”

I swallow thickly.

There’s a theory I have. The one that keeps me up at night sometimes, and then is smothered by the dawn. The one that has me playing a deliberately obtuse fool, because it’s impossible to imagine living in a world where it’s true.

It’s about Salisbury. And the Beast. And me. And a sneaking, impossible suspicion that seems almost too blindingly perfect to be real. There’s only one possibility, and it’s that my three-month long suspension actually did drive me insane, and this whole project has been an extended hallucination.

I’m not sure if the fact that Wellbelove and Dev have noticed something about the Beast is a point for or against this being a fabrication of my pathetic, lonely mind.

“Dev thinks so too,” I say weakly. I haven’t told Dev my theory. That I’m the Beast. That Salisbury is the Knight.

I turn my head to stare down at the cover. At Simon, his back arched up, his eyes closed in pain. At the Beast’s fingers — my fingers — reaching out toward him.

It’s getting harder for me to pretend that _Slain_ isn’t about us.

“Baz?” Wellbelove asks. “You look a bit flushed, are you okay?”

Taking a shaky breath, I look up at Wellbelove and try to pull myself back, try to put on the mask, try to calm the bubbling and churning and absolute anxiety and fear and exhilaration and confusion mixing in my stomach.

“Simon wrote _Slain_. Using a pen name. He wrote it.”

Wellbelove gapes at me.

“I’m sorry, what?”

“He wrote it. We didn’t think Mage would sign off, so we gave him a pen name.”

“Oh my God,” Wellbelove says. “Oh my God.” Her hands fly to her mouth. “Oh my God, and I used him as the model! And then—” her eyes are huge. “Oh my God, the Beast.”

I swallow and nod.

There’s the confirmation I’ve been looking for.

“Indeed,” I say, looking back down at the cover. “I think I’m the Beast.”

 

***

 

If Dev had an office, I would break into it and wait in his chair in the dark until he walked in, but as it is he shares a cubicle with a very nice woman named Keris who does not deserve to deal with this, so instead I drape myself atop his cubicle and stare at him.

“You alright there, mate?” he asks, looking up from his computer.

“Coffee.”

He sighs and closes down his computer and grabs his bag without a word.

I don’t know what it is I’m going to say to him. Just that I need to say something. I need to work this through somehow, and normally speaking to Dev is the worst thing in the world, but I can’t stop thinking about his comment ages ago about the Beast.

Me. And the Beast.

Jesus Christ, I’m an idiot. I’m an absolute disaster. I’m a disgrace and pathetic. Half of my mind is shouting at me that I’m insane for not seeing it from the beginning, and the other half is shouting at me that I’m insane for even thinking this. It’s impossible. I can’t be the Beast. Salisbury can’t — it can’t mean what I think.

This is what the last few months of my life have been. Vacillating from complete confidence one moment to believing my entire life is an extended day dream the next.

“Am I the Beast?” I ask Dev the moment we’re out the door of Pitch Publishing and walking toward the Costa. I turn on him, my eyes probably too wild, my eyebrows probably too sharp. “I’m not the Beast.”

“Uh,” Dev says, taking a few steps away from me and hurrying down the pavement. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“We’re nothing alike,” I insist, walking quicker to catch up to him. I feel like I’m chasing him down the street. “It’s not me.”

“Well, if you’re sure,” Dev says, frowning. “Then, sure. You’re not the Beast.”

“Being the Beast doesn’t mean anything,” I snap, reaching for the door of the Costa. “I’m just a character archetype. A good villain.”

“Uh, sure,” Dev says. “That sounds right.”

I stalk him through the Costa and toward the line, my shoulders hunched, my hands in my pockets. I’m not brooding. And I’m not pouting. I’m just thinking. Not brooding.

Dev keeps sneaking quick, freaked out glances at me as he orders our coffee, but I stay silent, following him to the table in the corner. I usually sit here with Salisbury.

“Look,” he says, his voice low. “I don’t blame you for feeling weird. It’s a bloody awkward situation.” He glances around the Costa. “I mean, you hate the bloke and then he writes some gut wrenching epic romance about you? It’s weird. But you don’t have to like… deal with it.”

“What?” I look up to meet his eyes. “What do you mean?”

“I just mean you never have to address it. Finish this book, get it out there, and then just go back to the _Scone_ shit. You never even have to bring it up. Just keep ignoring him. There. No problem, right?”

I stare down into my coffee and the silence grows between us.

“Baz? Is there a problem?”

I look up, refusing to meet his gaze, and nod. My eyes are locked on the wall behind him, because I can’t bear to make eye contact for this.

“There might be a problem,” I say tightly.

Dev sighs and closes his eyes. I can see him mentally preparing himself, and he nods and then opens them.

“What’s the problem, then?” he says wearily, like he’s talking to an obstinate toddler.

“I might…” I start, my fingernails picking at the label on my coffee, “possibly, potentially,” I rip off the label and run it between my fingers, “unfortunately, theoretically be a little bit in love with him. In a hypothetical way.”

Dev closes his eyes and sighs.

“Yeah, alright, I fucking called that one.” He clears his throat and looks back at me. “You’re a fucking idiot, you know that?”

I am. I absolutely am, but I’m not going to let Dev know that, so instead I fix him with my most intense and withering sneer.

“Look,” he says, leaning in. “There’s clearly something there. The Beast is you, clear as day. He wrote this book for you, whether he realises it or not.”

I look away from my cousin and out the window, where a million London tourists are walking by.

“He wrote it while I was on suspension,” I say. I’m thinking out loud, speaking before I’ve processed, which I never do. “He said it took him three months, and if you look at the timeline, it was while I was gone.”

“Holy shit,” Dev whispers. “The fucker was pining.”

“He said—” I stop. I can’t tell Dev what he said. About not knowing what the book meant. About working it out as he wrote. About the Knight’s scars.

Christ. Salisbury might not even know I’m the Beast.

“What did he say?” Dev asks. He’s far, far too interested.

“Nothing.”

He leaned into me. Salisbury. On the bridge, looking out over London. He leaned into my arms and turned his face into mine, and he was so _warm_. He was so sturdy and so warm, and he turned his face like he was searching for me.

But he was drunk. We were both drunk. How do I know that’s actually what happened? What if I was drunk and lonely and the part of me that’s been obsessed and intrigued by this frustrating disaster of a man just painted my own fantasy, something pulled right off the pages of the book I’m convinced was written for me?

If I’m the Beast, then Salisbury is the Knight, and the Knight never fails to act. He’s direct and forward. The second he knows what he wants, he takes it. He forces the Beast into softness. He steers the relationship. He fights until he wins the Beast’s heart.

Salisbury hasn’t been fighting.

And he didn’t plan for _Slain_ to be a love story.

Jesus Christ, he never meant for it to be a love story. He’s just figuring this out about himself. The Beast may be me, but that doesn’t mean he feels that way about me. It was an outlet. A learning experience, a self exploration journey.

It doesn’t mean he’s pining.

And that’s ignoring the largest issue in the room, which is that even, if by some freak of the universe someone as golden and happy and _good_ as Simon Salisbury has feelings for someone as dark and closed off and nasty as me, he’s still my writer. I’m still his editor. It would never work.

It could never work.

It could never happen.

It will never happen.

“What are you going to do now?” Dev asks, his voice quiet and direct. No mocking, no annoyance, none of his standard stupid affection.

“What do you mean?” I ask, clearing my throat and sitting up in my chair. I adjust my trousers and pick a piece of lint off of my cuff.

“Now that you know,” Dev says, frowning, “what’s the plan? Boombox under his window? Kiss in the rain?” He pauses and grins. “Sword to the heart?”

“Of course not,” I say, sniffing. “I’m not going to do anything.”

I stand up and pick up my coffee, and then nod at my cousin.

“Good chat,” I tell him, raising my cup in salute. “Tell anyone and I’ll kill you.”


	11. Chapter 11

**SS:** hey im running late for the scone meeting, sorry

 **SS:** want me to grab you a coffee?

 **BP:** _I won’t be at the meeting today._

 **SS:** oh, ok. Pub, 6? I can fill you in.

 **BP:** I have a cold.

 

That’s a lie. I don’t have a cold. I just couldn’t face that meeting. Because I’m a coward, I’ve chosen to avoid Salisbury at all costs. We haven’t been to the pub in almost two weeks, and have only had coffee once, which I cut short.

I haven’t been able to make myself stop texting him, though. Because I’m weak. And pathetic. But that’s fine. I can control that. It’s just the pub that’s dangerous. The pub means watching Simon turn ruddy and flushed. It means that he smells like cinnamon and smiles too much. And it means that my odds of repeating the bridge incident — of folding myself over him like the world’s boniest blanket — are much higher.

If I don’t see him, I can’t throw myself at him.

It was one thing when I could push it out of mind, out of sight. When appreciating his shoulders and freckled hands was a bonus to making him so angry his cheeks turned red. But now it’s as though everything has been unlocked. I wasn’t lying when I told him I think about everything. I’m always thinking.

I wish I could be like him and turn off my brain.

But I can’t. And every time I try to push him away, a small voice in the back of my mind pops up with a crushing optimism and hope, a voice that sounds like Salisbury himself.

_What if you aren’t wrong? What if he did write it for you? What if he wants you?_

But the world doesn’t work like that.

So I’ll keep him at arm’s length.

 

 **SS:** Oh :(

 **SS:** feel better!

 

I close my eyes and drop my mobile to the sofa and unpause the television as I stretch out my legs under my blanket. Fiona flicks me an annoyed glare.

“Fuck off,” I mumble at her, and go back to watching _Game of Thrones_ like the emotionally constipated person I am.

But it’s not so easy to avoid Salisbury.

 

 **SS:** did you tell aggie about slain

 **BP:** _yes_

 **SS:** what the fuck. it’s not a secret if you keep telling people

 **BP:** _How did you find out?_

 **SS:** she just asked if ive seen the cover

 **SS:** can I see it?

 **BP:** _Did you miss that bit about me being home with a cold?_

 **SS:** do you need anything?

 **BP:** _What?_

 **SS:** do you need anything? Like soup or tea or whatever.

 **SS:** I’m not doing anything, I can pop by

 **BP:** _Is this just a desperate ploy to see the cover?_

 **SS:** no im actually just being nice

 **BP:** _Why would you want to come see me when I have a cold?_

 **SS:** because I want to see the cover

 

No. He can’t come over. He absolutely cannot come to my flat, where it will be just him and me and Fiona. And my sofa.

 

 **BP:** _fine_

 **BP:** _bring cheese chips_

 

I’m so fucking weak.

 

***

 

The buzzer for my flat goes off forty minutes later, and my heart is racing. Snow has never been to my flat before. That’s actually a been bit of the line: we’ve never been to each other’s homes. I don’t know why I agreed to this. If being at the pub is too much, then this has to be a spectacularly terrible idea.

I turn to Fiona before I open the door.

“Be nice,” I warn. She doesn’t say anything, just glares at me, and I take a deep breath and open the door.

Salisbury is standing in my hallway, holding two coffees and a brown take away bag.

“You don’t look sick,” he says, an accusatory tone in his voice. “You look fine.” He looks down and frowns. “You’re wearing jeans.”

Some of my tension eases. I don’t know what I’d expected, but having his first words be ones of suspicion seems right. It’s grounding.

“Of course I am,” I drawl, taking my coffee from him. “I don’t sit around the house in a suit.”

“No,” he says, following me into the flat and kicking off his shitty trainers absentmindedly, “I mean, you’re sick and you’re sitting around in jeans.”

“I’m not exactly going to greet company in my pyjamas,” I respond, leading him through the foyer and into my main room. “Some of us have manners.”

“You didn’t have to get dressed,” he says with a shrug. “It’s just me — oh my god what is that?”

He’s standing open mouthed, staring at the sofa where Fiona is sitting, glaring at him.

“That’s Fiona,” I say, raising an eyebrow and taking the bag from him. “Fiona, this is Salisbury.”

I sit down on the sofa and set the bag on the table. I’m actually starving, but I feel weird eating finger foods around other people. I asked for the chips on a whim, and now I’m regretting it.

“Are you just going to stand there?” I ask him, gesturing to the spot next to Fiona. “Sit down.”

“I thought you said Fiona was your aunt.”

He’s still standing there, gaping like a fucking idiot.

“She is.”

Salisbury shakes his head, his blue eyes wide.

“Baz, that’s a _cat_.”

“Don’t talk about her like that,” I frown. “She’s being perfectly polite to you, no need to be rude.”

“Why did you tell me your cat was your aunt?”

“Because we’re not peers?” I glance at Fiona. She’s glaring at Salisbury out of her one good eye, and the white streak that runs across her head is sticking on edge. Her torn ear is twitching, and I should really get him to move back before she leaps for his throat, but I’m almost curious to see how this will go.

“She used to belong to my grandparents,” I say. “We’re not friends, and she’s not a belonging. She’s more like a judgy aunt who sometimes pisses on things.”

Salisbury doesn’t take his eyes off of her as he slowly sits on the sofa, shaking his head.

“This is the weirdest fucking thing,” he mutters. “I knew you were evil, but I didn’t know you were like, insane as well.” Fiona lets out a low growl and Salisbury throws his hands in the air. “Oh my God, call her off.”

“I don’t control her,” I say, reaching for my coffee. “If you’ve pissed her off that’s your fault.”

He scoots closer and closer toward me until our knees are touching, and I want to die. This is why I convinced myself I was insane for so long. So I didn’t have to face up to the reality of this: how every time he touches me or leans into me or sits near me, I want to grab his stupid freckled face and kiss him until I pass out and then wake up and beg him to love me.

Casually.

“The _Slain_ cover is on the desk, if you’re done climbing me,” I snark, turning away from him. I don’t want him to move, but I can’t stand him staying there. Feeling his body warmth beside me is practically burning me alive.

He rockets up out of his seat, crossing the room to where I have my desk set in front of the window, and I focus back on the television where _Game of Thrones_ is paused.

“Aw. Is this you and your mum?”

My head snaps over to where Salisbury is standing, a small photo frame in his hand. I don’t need to see which one it is; there’s only two photos of me and my mother in this flat. The one from my first day of Cambridge, where we’re standing in front of King’s College. It was the last photo of us ever taken. And then there’s the one in Salisbury’s hands, one of the first ones taken, when I was a baby and chubby and wearing bright blue bloomers and running toward her outstretched arms.

It was taken in her office at Pitch Publishing. The desk where Mage now sits is in the background.

“Yes,” I say, standing up and moving toward him. I take it out of his hands carefully and set it back on the desk.

“You were adorable,” he says, grinning. “I like your little bloomers.”

“I’m still adorable,” I snap, snatching up my work folder and slapping it into his chest. “Here. Look at your cover.”

His grin falters for a moment as he opens the folder and stares down at the cover, his brows becoming more and more wrinkled.

“He—”

“Looks just like you?” I finish, nodding. “Wellbelove modelled him off you. Now you see why I told her.”

Salisbury’s cheeks flush a delightful red.

“He’s not me,” he says quickly, darting his eyes toward me. “I mean, I didn’t like, write myself into it. We’re not— I don’t—”

“We’re going to get rid of his freckles,” I interrupt. I might as well save him from himself. “And the mole.”

Salisbury nods and traces his fingers over the cover, tracing the lines of the sword, running along the snow, and stopping on the Beast’s hands. His touch is so light. So careful.

“We got some blurbs in as well,” I say, my voice coming out softer than I expected. “They’ve been positive.”

Reaching across him, I carefully flip the cover over to reveal the printed blurbs. I’d sent the rough galley around to several authors I’ve worked with, to see if anyone wanted to review. I’d thought I’d get one or two bites, but I was surprised by the response.

Salisbury’s eyes greedily scan the page.

 _“Slain is heartbreaking and tender,”_ he reads. _“Game of Thrones meets Romeo and Juliet. The queer fantasy you’ve been waiting for.”_ His smile gets so wide it looks like it’s going to take over his face. _“A triumph.”_

“That’s the one I think we’ll put on the cover,” I say, taking the folder from him and placing it back on the desk. “It’s nice and succinct.”

I make the mistake of turning to look at him while I speak. I’m close. I’m too close. Our faces are nearly touching, that stupid smile still taking up his whole face, his blue eyes so close they’re nearly all I can see.

“Yeah,” he says quietly. His eyes drop to my lips. “That’s the one I like most.”

We stay there. Staring. Too close. This is almost suffocating, how close we are. How intimate this is. It’s too much. I’m too weak.

“If you’re going to invade my flat while I’m ill, then do you mind letting me get back to _Game of Thrones_?” I ask, stepping away from him and taking a deep breath. “I’ve just gotten to the worst episode.”

Salisbury stares at me for a moment, his mouth slightly open. He looks confused, bordering on angry, and I can tell that it takes him several moments for my words to catch up.

“There are no bad episodes,” he says, trailing me to the sofa. I sit down next to Fiona, so he doesn’t have to, but when he takes his spot he sits far too close to me again.

“Even you’re not stupid enough to believe that,” I drawl, reaching for my coffee. I’m trying to steady myself. I don’t know why I invited him to watch television with me. I should have thrown him out.

“Yeah, yeah, alright,” he huffs. “Just turn the fucking show on.” He throws one arm over the back of the sofa. It’s not touching me, but close. “And keep that freaky cat away from me.”

 

***

 

Four hours later, Fiona is asleep on my lap and Salisbury is snoring on my shoulder.

It’s hell.

He has his cheek pressed into my shoulder and his hair is tickling my face, and I know that it would be so easy for me to just let the show keep playing and tilt my head sideways and fall asleep with my cat and the man I’m in love with. And then we could wake up hours later blurry and sleepy and share soft smiles and then, maybe, he’d lean up and kiss me. And then he would decide he wanted to spend the rest of the night on my sofa, locked together, and Fiona would be an absolute beast about it, but I wouldn’t care.

It’s hell, because if I let myself, it could potentially be rather like Heaven.

But I’m a weak, pathetic thing, so I don’t.

Instead I sit here, because I don’t want to wake him, and think over his stumbling words.

 _“He’s not me,”_ he said. _“I didn’t write myself into it.”_

I may be the Beast, but I don’t know if Salisbury knows that. Because he certainly doesn’t want to be the Knight.

Maybe if I were braver, I’d just tell him. I’d point out that he’s an absolute lunatic who over identifies with his writing, and I’d shove him into a wall and tell him that he needs to be more original with his subject matter, and then I’d kiss him.

There’s a segment in _Slain_ that I really love. I’d never tell Salisbury, but it’s what knocked me down the first time I read the book. It’s the bit that made me pay attention.

 _“Fighting is easy,”_ _the Beast said. “It takes nothing for me to crush their skulls and drink their blood. Fighting isn’t what takes bravery, Knight. It’s choosing to stop.” The Beast turned away. “And I’ll fight until I die.”_

It’s uncomfortable to think of how well Salisbury knows me, that he was able to cut to the heart of who I am: it’s easier for me to push people away and fight them to the death than to let down my guard and let them in.

I don’t know how he figured this out. I don’t know if he even realises how perceptive he was. But he’s not wrong.

I’m not brave enough to push this. I don’t want to end up with a sword through my heart.

I wouldn’t survive it.

 

***

 

_The Beast was like a wounded animal._

_Back into a corner, lashing out in self-defence, terrified of what would come next. Like the fox that had been caught in the Knight’s snare all those months ago: they would rather bash themselves bloody than let the Knight close to help._

_Luckily, the Knight knew how to handle wounded animals._

_He’d sat with the fox until it grew comfortable with his presence. He’d been persistent and steady with the mice that he’d found under his bed in the Palace. He respected their limits, but he pushed._

_He rather suspected that he would have to push the Beast._

_“I’ve been looking in your library,” he announced at breakfast the next day. The Beast didn’t typically come down to eat with him, so the Knight had begun taking his meals up to the tower and sitting on the floor with his food while the Beast poured over his thick books and played with his strange concoctions._

_“Why would you do that? I didn’t know you could read,” the Beast snarled._

_The Knight couldn’t. No one had taught him. But he didn’t want to admit that to the Beast. In truth, the only reason he’d brought it up was an excuse to start conversation and stay close. He needed to observe the Beast. He needed to find his weaknesses._

_He needed to understand him._

_“I thought you’d want to explain the book on your Curse to me,” the Knight said._

_The Beast spun, nearly dropping his bottle of dark green liquid._

_“Tomorrow. Today I need you to go to the stream and bring me back water, and the only red leaf on a yellow tree.”_

_The Knight sighed. The Beast was doing everything he could to keep him away. Sending him on nonsensical errands, inventing labour to be done around the Keep. But the Knight had seen through it. He may not be as clever and book-smart as the Beast, but he knew people. He knew nature._

_He knew Beasts._


	12. Chapter 12

“I can’t do this, my hand is going to fall off.” Salisbury throws down his Sharpie and flexes his wrist, massaging it slightly with his other hand as he gives me a look that is half-fury, half-puppy dog. “No one can do this.”

“Just a few more,” I respond looking back down at my laptop. “Then you are free to go eat or sleep or drown yourself until tomorrow.”

“This is insane!” he shouts, shaking his head and pushing back from the conference table. He can’t go far; he just pushes into another mountain of _Sir Scone_ books. The whole room is littered with stacks of them, just waiting to be signed in anticipation of tomorrow’s release event at the local bookstore.

The signed stack is currently much smaller than the to-be-signed stack.

“Mage wants two hundred copies,” I drawl, still typing at my spreadsheet. There’s loads to be done before the event, and somehow it always comes down on me at the last moment, even though these ridiculous signings and readings are Mage’s idea. “Take it up with him.”

“Baz,” Salisbury whispers, all large eyes. “Can we just get food now? Please? I’ll finish when we come back. Just. I need a break.”

I look at him like I’m considering it. I am hungry.

“No.”

“Jesus fucking Christ!” he growls, grabbing a book and pulling it towards him as he uncaps a sharpie and picks it up in his left hand.

“Don’t you fucking dare sign that with your left hand,” I warn, closing my laptop. Salisbury shakes his head.

“Don’t care,” he growls. “I gotta. My wrist can’t take anymore.”

“Christ, you’re a baby,” I mutter, grabbing a black Sharpie and a book and dragging it toward me. “Here, hand me one of your signed ones.”

“What?”

“A signed one, one you did already with a good signature, let me see it.”

Salisbury stares suspiciously and hands me a book from his signed stack. I flip it open and glance at the coverplate for a moment, and then, carefully, repeat the signature on the blank page in front of me.

It’s a bit tighter, but an overall decent showing for my first try.

“Another,” I say, pushing the books away. Salisbury stares at me.

“You— You can’t! That’s — that’s forgery!”

“It’s this or you can finish them all yourself,” I snap. “Now hand me that stack, you take the other one, and then we can eat.”

Salisbury’s moral compass holds up for less than a second before he’s shoving a mountain of books at me.

“How are you so good at forging my signature?” He looks up. “Have you done that before?”

“Not for you,” I say honestly, making my next signature a little sloppier. There. Perfect. “I used to do this for my mother and her authors.”

“What?”

I flip the cover on a book and pull another toward me, not looking up.

“When I was a kid, I used to get bored. My mum’s authors always bitched about this too, and I’m handy with mimicking, so she used to have me sit in and help them do their signings.”

“How old were you?”

“About ten.” I snap the lid on a book and reach for another. “She’s the reason for my coffee habit. After a signing, she’d take me down to the Costa and let me get whatever I wanted.”

“She gave a ten year-old coffee?”

“I was a hard-working ten year-old, and my mother understood that.”

Salisbury does his tiny huffing snort laugh and signs another book with a shaky hand.

“She sounds like she was fun,” he says quietly, setting the book on the stack. I focus closely on the book I’m signing. My signature goes a little messier than intended.

“She was very serious,” I answer. “Very work-oriented. That’s where I get it from, I suppose. But she was fun. More than people realise, she was fun in her own way.” I clear my throat and take another book. I’m going far faster than he is. “We’re not very similar in that regard, at least.”

Salisbury snaps the cover closed on another book, and then leans to stretch out his back. It’s a hideous and flashy affair.

I focus on my book, feeling slightly shaken and a little raw. I never talk about my mother. There’s always weights and memory and legacy attached. But I forget sometimes Salisbury never knew her. To him, she isn’t Natasha Pitch. She’s just my mum. He doesn’t realise that talking about her feels like talking about a monolith.

“I think you’re extremely fun. In a shitty way.” He rubs his hands together, stretches them, then takes another book. “The release events you put together are always fun, at least.”

I let out a breath, eager for the change in subject.

“Have you decided what chapter to read from _Sir Scone_ tomorrow?”

Salisbury squiggles a signature that looks more like a lightning bolt than a name and shrugs. “Not yet. I figured I would do the first chapter, but Mage wants me to pick something really impressive, and I dunno what really qualifies.”

“Why?” I keep my tone even. I need to get through the next twenty-four hours without Salisbury and I killing each other, and avoiding the topic of Mage is crucial to making that happen.

“The TV show people will be there, and he wants to sell them on the new release. Now they’re talking about a movie franchise.” Salisbury literally doodles a star and closes the cover of his book. I grab it and pull it toward me quickly to give it a real signature.

“Well,” I hum. “That’s one perspective.”

I’m being so polite. Salisbury should worship me for how polite and mature I’m being, and I’m doing it for him, and it will just go unnoticed, because the man is an idiot and unfeeling.

“What do you think?” he pushes. “Which part do you suggest?”

“Whichever one you want,” I say evenly, taking the book he’s trying to draw a stick figure in. His marker skids along the page. “They’re all the same.”

“No, really, which one?”

I sigh and close the book. I’ve been signing far, far more than he has, because he’s being a petulant child. I’m not signing any more until he starts again.

“If I had to pick a best scene,” I say carefully, trying to sound bored, “which is difficult, because they’re all awful,” I add, “I would say the scene in the Cave of Wanders, where Sir Scone and the Seer get lost.”

“That one?” he asks, frowning. His face is scrunched up in confusion. “Really? You think kids would like it?”

“It’s my little brother’s favourite scene,” I admit, and then promptly want to set myself on fire for admitting it. It’s my deepest shame. My own brother is a _Sir Scone_ super fan. He has the bedsheets and everything.

Salisbury looks like I’ve just told him I’ve shit my pants.

“Your little brother has read it?” he asks, gaping.

“I always give him the galleys,” I say dismissively. I should never have told him. I’ve always planned to keep Augustine’s obsession a shameful little secret.

“Oh,” Salisbury says, grinning. “That’s really nice. Thank you.”

“It’s not by choice,” I say quickly, before he thinks I’m to blame for this, or that I like his books enough to share them with the youth in my life. “My step-mother’s parents got him into them, and he’s become a monster. He’s obnoxiously attached to the books.” I pause. I shouldn’t tell him. I shouldn’t confess my last secret. “He had a _Sir Scone_ birthday party last year, much to my father and my’s horror.”

Salisbury’s face fucking lights up.

“You should have told me, I would have sent something,” he says, grinning as he reaches for another book.

“Why?” He shrugs, doodles a heart and _Simon_ , and reaches for another.

“Because it would have made him happy.”

Well that’s just an unacceptably lovely answer.

“I’m bringing him tomorrow,” I grit out. “To the signing.”

It was already planned, of course. Because despite having horrible taste in books, I do love my little brother. And the idea of Salisbury meeting my family is both horrifying and oddly heartwarming.

“Yeah?” he asks, grinning. “Make sure he says hi, I’d love to meet him.”

I look away from him and focus on the book in front of me.

“He’s evil,” I say. Salisbury shrugs, closes his book, and props his head on his hand as he looks at me. Full on looks, with a fucking smile and a steady gaze.

“Of course he is,” he says steadily. But not coldly. “He’s related to you.”

His tone sounds almost fond.

 

***

 

Mage is late, the television executives are not here, we’ve run out of signed books, and a child upended the large punch bowl in the corner, and now there are youths with swords covered in grape juice running around.

I hate these release parties.

It’s just pure chaos from every side. My sainted step-mother has a firm hand on Augustine, who tried to take out another child’s eye with the special edition _Sir Scone_ lance that Salisbury gave him (because he’s a fucking idiot), and my head has been ringing with the sounds of laughter and shrieks and child noise for the past hour.

But now there’s silence, and I’m realising that a room of silent children is actually more unnerving than a room full of screaming ones.

All eyes are locked onto Salisbury, who is sitting on a fake throne in the corner, reading. He has a foam sword in one hand which he occasionally swings for emphasis and a toy dragon on his shoulder, and the children are gazing at him like he’s a freckled god.

I don’t usually stay for his readings. Normally I step out to take a call or have a smoke or generally avoid Mage, so it’s been a bit since I’ve heard him do a reading. I’d forgotten how _alive_ the books come when he narrates them.

 _“If you’re looking for an adventure, sometimes the best thing to do is to stay still. That’s what the Grand Wizard always said, at least. Quests have a way of finding you, if you’re willing to make life itself an adventure,”_ Salisbury says, his voice pitching up and down with the flow of the words. Children giggle expectantly as he turns the page and makes a face _. ”But Sir Scone stared at the open cave mouth and knew that if he took two more steps, he’d be in for an exciting day indeed. Putting on his helmet, he took five running leaps. He could stay still another day.”_

It also makes me realise how much of his heart Salisbury has poured into this drivel.

I don’t know how I never saw it before; I always knew Salisbury put a bit of himself into _Sir Scone_ , but now I see that he split himself down the middle. He gave all his best features to Sir Scone and all his worst to the Knight in _Slain_. Sir Scone has all the goodness and bravery and softness of Simon, while the Knight has his temper, his anger, his suspiciousness and obstinance.

Maybe that’s why I hate Sir Scone and love the Knight. Sir Scone is an idealised hero. The Knight is real.

 

_“Sir Scone and the Seer walked further and further into the Cave of Wanders, until they felt like they had travelled for a week, and the Seer didn’t want to go any further. She kept checking her purple ring to find the way out, but she couldn’t see anything._

_‘We should go back,’ she said. ‘It could be risky.’_

_But Sir Scone took her hand in his and kept walking. What was the point of an adventure without risks? Sir Scone thought that everything worth doing required a little bit of bravery and a whole lot of will.”_

 

 _“After all,”_ Salisbury continues, looking up through the crowd and meeting my eyes. He pauses, the break in his flow heavy with intention, and won’t look away from me. _“Sir Scone couldn’t think of any good adventure that had actually happened from staying still.”_

Sometimes I hate him.

Salisbury has a way of walking into my brain and looking at the fucking disaster of thoughts inside of it and dropping just earth shattering, impossible words of wisdom. Whenever I ask myself _“why would I?”_ Simon always manages to come through and ask me _“why wouldn’t you?”_

I’m not a risk taker. He knows this about me. He knows me better than myself, I think, considering how well he wrote the Beast.

But maybe I don’t want to be the Beast. Maybe I don’t want to hide and lie and push away.

Salisbury finishes his paragraph and looks up through the crowd again and smiles at me. He’s gorgeous, and impossible, and right there. He’s right there, and yet I’m staying still.

Maybe, just once, I want to take a risk. Maybe I want to fight. Maybe, just maybe, I want to be Sir Scone.

 


	13. Chapter 13

Grey is most definitely Simon Salisbury’s colour.

It’s a miserable, pissing rain kind of day and the whole office is shrouded in that dim foggy light that settles over London, and yet Simon is glowing in a light grey suit.

I’ve never seen him in a suit before; he never dressed up for any of our early meetings, and the release events barely warrant a nice jumper. Part of me wonders if the suit was on Mage’s orders, because I cannot imagine Salisbury taking the initiative to dress this nicely to the meeting with the CBBC executives.

There is absolutely nothing I don’t like about him in this suit, and it was terrible timing for him to have done this.

Of course I wouldn’t tell him that he looks absolutely delicious in it. When I walked in with coffee for he and Bunce, all I did was comment that he’d brushed his hair, and that alone set his cheeks on fire. God knows what he would have done if I’d acknowledged the suit.

Whatever his reasoning for wearing it, I’m glad he did. The CBBC people are dressed impeccably, and they’re sharp looking. One is a producer, the other some kind of miscellaneous showrunner, and neither of them seem the type to appreciate Salisbury’s typical trackies. 

Neither seem like they ever had a childhood at all, to be frank, and the dry tones with which they’re going on about the  _ Sir Scone _ books nearly has me falling asleep. Between them and Mage, I don’t think Salisbury has said a single word.

“Now, we know that you didn’t like some of our direction notes in the last meeting,” says the producer, a man with an exceptionally shiny bald head. “We still don’t have a writer in, but we were thinking of maybe a compromise? Take out the princess, but keep in the dragon as a pet-type companion. A bit goofy and fun! Or maybe make him a bit jaded and cynical, for a different humour component?”

“I think that’s an excellent suggestion,” Mage says, nodding. I glance at Salisbury, who had sat forward to answer, and has promptly leant back in his chair. He’s staring down at the table top, scratching idly at the varnish. “I was thinking perhaps we could—”

“Salisbury,” I interrupt. “What do you think?”

He nearly jerks in surprise at being addressed, and hurries to sit up.

“Well,” Salisbury says, his eyes darting toward Mage. “I don’t think that’s realistic to the source material. I just, er, I mean, you don’t need  _ Sir Scone _ to make a show about a knight and his pet dragon, yeah? That’s pretty generic. So, if that’s what you’re going for, why try to pretend it’s connected to the books?”

Salisbury’s eyes flicker to Bunce, and I see her give an infinitesimal nod. Good. Clearly they went over this before hand. That reeks of Bunce’s blunt logic.

“I rather suspect that what they need is the name and marketing power of  _ Sir Scone _ ,” I drawl.

Mage meets my eye and blinks. There’s a cool rage underneath it, and I know he’s trying not to explode. He didn’t want me at this meeting: he never even told me it was happening. Simon did. When Mage walked in with the executives and saw me sitting here, his moustache started twitching.

Simon looks at me and smiles, and then glances back at the table.

“It’s just, Sir Scone’s friendship with the dragon is what really makes the books,” he says, his fingers picking at the cuffs of his suit. “I’ve worked hard on these books and characters, and I’d love to see them on TV so more kids could meet them. But I don’t want to hand it over to people who don’t understand the spirit of the books and the story.”

“We completely understand, Mr. Salisbury,” says the other executive, the woman with the immaculate blow out. “That’s why we’ve had so many conversations with Mr. Mage to try to figure out the heart of these books. We want to keep the integrity your story, and he’s been extremely helpful. It was his idea to make the dragon more humorous, actually!”

“Sorry,” I say, leaning forward, “do you mean your suggestions have come from Mr. Mage, here? The suggestions that Mr. Salisbury doesn’t like?”

“Well, as I said, we don’t have a writer yet,” the executive says, “so, yes. Mr. Mage has been helping us shape the creative direction. We really want to be a part of the  _ Sir Scone _ family.”

I glance at Salisbury, pray he’ll forgive me, and then turn to Mage.

“Mr. Mage, I’m a bit surprised that as  _ Sir Scone _ ’s biggest…” I pause, let the silence hang, and continue, “supporter, that it was your idea to change the dragon’s role so much. Especially since he is, I think Simon would agree, central to the plot.”

“He is,” Salisbury adds quickly. “Very much so.”

“Come now, Mr. Pitch,” Mage says cooly, completely ignoring Salisbury. “There’s over a dozen books to choose from. Surely we have enough detail to pull to create a story that accurately reflects these beloved books  without putting all emphasis on the dragon.  _ Sir Scone _ is the attraction here, not his friends.”

Well that’s a bullshit answer.

“What plots would you recommend, then?” I ask. “What is your favourite plot, Davy? From the more recent books.”

He narrows his eyes, and I realise I’ve struck onto something.

This fucker hasn’t read the books. Or at least not the recent ones. I know he’s read the first one: the one where the princess is a love interest and the dragon is a bit goofier. But those aspects all turn around with the subsequent books. Salisbury and I fought about it for years: I’m excruciatingly well acquainted with the character development of the books. I put my blood sweat and tears into turning the dragon into a more nuanced character, and it’s the  _ only _ edit that Salisbury has ever thanked me for.

But Mage doesn’t seem to be aware of that.

“There are plenty of lovely things to choose from,” he says, and then turns back to the television executives. “Once you have a writer in, there’s dozens of strings to pull for ideas.”

“But we’ve come back to the original problem, which is that Mr. Salisbury does not think the current team is in agreement with him in regard to how to implement those ideas,” I say, my voice carrying. “Ms. Bunce, Mr. Salisbury, would you say that’s accurate?”

“Very well summarised,” Bunce says tightly. Salisbury just nods, his eyes wide. He looks like he’s holding his breath.

“If I may,” I continue, shifting in my seat, “there’s an easy solution which would appease all parties.”

Bunce turns her neck to stare at me so fast I’m amazed it doesn’t snap off, and Mage looks fucking purple. I probably should have floated this idea to Bunce first, but considering I came up with it thirty seconds ago, there wasn’t much time to plan.

“Have Salisbury write your scripts,” I say. Salisbury nearly chokes, and Bunce’s eyes light up.

“What?”

“You need a writer,” Bunce says, jumping in. I nod and lean back. She’s the agent; let her sell this. “Simon is hesitant to hand over his property to someone who doesn’t understand the spirit of the work. We could solve everyone’s concerns by bringing him on as a writer.”

“Well, we’d have to consider it,” the bald executive says, glancing between his colleague and Mage. “I mean, that is if Mr. Salisbury is even interested, we—”

“I am,” Salisbury says quickly. “Er, yeah, I mean. Yeah. I am.” He clears his throat, adjusts his suit jacket, and sits up straighter. “If I’m included on the writing staff,” he says, now sounding confident and authoritative, “I’ll sell you the rights to  _ Sir Scone _ .”

His eyes flick sideways to meet mine, and he smiles.

  
  


***

 

“I still can’t believe that happened,” Salisbury says, running his hand over the back of his head. “I’m still a bit gobsmacked.”

He’s sprawled in the chair in my office, his tie half loosened, his jacket thrown over the back of the chair. Bunce has only just left after the three of us sequestered ourselves in here after the meeting, and he looks like he’s been through a whirlwind.

“It’s not done yet,” I remind him, leaning back against my desk until I’m half-perched on it. Normally I’d sit on the other side of it, far away from him, but I don’t want to. This feels like a moment of celebration; I want to be close. “They still have to agree to seal the deal.”

“Penny will hound them until they do,” he says with a shrug. “Oi, how did you even come up with this whole idea?”

“It seemed logical,” I say, leaning back to grab a mint off my desk and pop it into my mouth. I offer him one silently, and he leans forward to take three. “You were always going to say yes to the show — you’d be an idiot not to. And this way you can control it yourself.”

“I’ve never written a script before,” he says, popping the mints in his mouth one after enough.

“Yes, well, several months ago you’d never written gay erotica, and look at you now.”

He doesn’t blush or bluster, which annoys me. It’s a sign that he’s gotten comfortable with the jokes and the dragon dick comments, which means that I no longer can use them to humiliate him. What a waste.

“Thank you,” he says quietly, sitting up straighter in his chair. “For suggesting it. And, you know, for fighting for what I want. For me. You keep doing that.” He gives a small, derisive snort that sounds unnatural, and turns away. “I know it’s mostly about fucking with Mage and making him look stupid, but, you know. Thanks.”

I adjust the sleeve of my jacket and and stare down at the floor. I’ll only say this once. Once and then never again. It’ll take all the courage I have to get it out.

“It’s not just about Mage,” I say. He looks back up at me and raises one eyebrow, as if he doesn’t believe me, and I sigh.

“Simon, I’m your editor,” I say, gently. “And your... friend.” I pause for a moment, terrified. “I’ll always fight for you.”

I dare to look at him, just for a second. He’s staring up at me from the chair, his jaw clenched tight, his hand balled up in the fabric of his trouser leg. He’s not saying anything, and he’s deathly still. Waiting for me, I think.

I wonder how long he’s been subconsciously waiting for me.

I take a deep breath. I’ve planned this. I’ve thought of this. I’ve stayed up late thinking over these exact words, and whether they’ll convey to him exactly what I mean.

“Sometimes,” I start, pausing, and then throwing myself off the cliff into the terrifying unknown sea of Simon Snow Salisbury, “I think I’d fight everyone for you.”

And then he moves. He shoots up out of his chair and crowds me against my desk before I even have time to process it, and my entire world and space is invaded by blue eyes and grey fabric and cinnamon and warmth.

“Fuck, I was hoping you’d say that,” he whispers. 

Then he grabs my tie and drags me toward him.

We don’t collide; he stops just short of slamming his face into mine and instead slowly, carefully, kisses me.

My hands come up to grasp around his back, pulling him in, and I kiss him back. I’m kissing Simon Salisbury. I’m kissing Simon Salisbury in my office on top of my desk like some kind of sad erotica, and his hands are cupping my cheeks and he’s pulling my bottom lip into his mouth, and it’s  _ everything _ .

He kisses like his characters fight; bravely, unabashedly, wholeheartedly. I flex my fingers into his back and pull him even closer, and I catch myself humming against his mouth.

The same earth-shattering syrupy warmth that flooded my body that night on the bridge is trickling down my spine, because everything is warm and soft and Salisbury is doing this thing with his chin and it’s indescribable how comfortable this is.

It’s nothing like  _ Slain _ , though. In the book, the Knight and the Beast kiss each other bloody. They bite and claw at each other, they push each other into walls, they fight through their kisses and it’s all consuming.

This isn’t like that.

This is real.

I pull away from the kiss first, leaving a quick, shy nip at the corner of Salisbury’s mouth, and rest my forehead against his. His eyes are closed, but without looking he carefully moves his head to nuzzle his face against my cheek. It almost breaks me.

“Am I the Beast?” I whisper. I have to know. Even after this, even after the kiss. I need it confirmed.

“Maybe,” he whispers back, shrugging. “You weren’t meant to be. Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” I say, tightening my arms around him. His hands are curling through the hair at the back of my neck, and I can  _ smell _ him he’s so close. God, he’s so close and so warm. “I rather like it.”

“Of course you do,” he sighs. “Fucking weirdo.”   
  



	14. Chapter 14

My alarm goes off at seven, and Simon throws Fiona on me at 8:15.

“You slept through your alarm,” he says on his way out of my room, completely blind to my shouts of agony, or the fact that Fiona has attached herself to me with her ragged claws and is growling in my ear.

“Good fucking morning to you too, darling,” I snarl back, attempting to unlatch Fiona from my face and sit up. My head is throbbing, and not just from the cat. I may have had too much wine at dinner last night.

There’s a crashing from the kitchen that indicates Simon has decided to make breakfast and I roll over, mashing Fiona to the mattress, and lay there for a moment, listening to him.

Simon does this now, whenever he stays over (which is most days, at this point). I hate it. He destroys my kitchen and leaves dishes everywhere, and he point blank refuses to bring me food in bed. Unless it’s a Sunday. He’ll bring me coffee on Sundays.

Struggling out of bed, I stumble my way toward the kitchen, following the sounds and smells until I’m greeted by the sight of Simon in front of my stove, wearing one of my jumpers and his boxers, making breakfast.

That familiar warmth tingles down my spine at the sight of him here. Sinfully, impossibly domestic.

“I needed to be awake at seven,” I say, crowding him toward the stove while reaching behind him for the French press with one hand while checking my mobile with the other. Already thirteen emails. Not bad for a release day.

“I tried,” he says, elbowing me out of the way. “You told me to get fucked.”

“Well that doesn’t sound like me at all,” I respond, pushing him back and grabbing the coffee and retreating to the table. A mug appears in front of me, carried over by my scowling boyfriend. It’s filled with sugar and cream.

“Why are you so shitty?” I ask, pouring the coffee and taking a long sip. It’s far too hot, but I’ve long since burnt my mouth into submission. “This is your big day. Be perky or something.”

“It’s not my big day,” he says, mouth full of bacon as he shoves two plates onto the table, “it’s Oliver Snow’s big day.” He bites off another piece of bacon aggressively. “We don’t even have a release event or signing. It feels weird.” He shrugs. “Feels fake.”

There’s a small twinge in my stomach as I fire off an answering email to Bunce. I do wish he could have all that. He’s a beloved author, used to huge fanfare when his books come out, and now the best thing he’s ever written is releasing to absolute silence.

“About that,” I say, carefully buttering my toast. “Do you have dinner plans tonight?”

Simon shakes his head.

“Nah, I figured you’d be working late with the release stuff, so I’d just grab some curry with Micah or something.”

“My schedule is actually rather clear. I thought we could do dinner here, to celebrate.”

“But we did that last night,” he argues. “You don’t have to take me to dinner twice, seriously. Last night was brilliant.”

I take a sip of my coffee and raise my eyebrows suggestively. Last night _was_ brilliant. Simon sees the motion and goes beet red. I love making him flush. I tap his bare foot with my socked one. I love him.

“Oh!” he shouts, rocketing up from the table and moving to the counter where he always throws his laptop bag when he comes by. “I have something for you.” He pulls out a large, spiral bound book and thunks it on the table in front of me. It looks even larger than _Slain_ , which is already the longest book I’ve ever edited in my entire career.

“What is this?” I ask, gesturing with my coffee. “More dragon porn?”

He sighs and pulls his feet up into the chair and spoons eggs onto his toast.

“It’s my new book. You told me to give it to you when we got through _Slain_.” He taps it. “I printed it out because I know you like to edit on paper, and I figured I’d save you a step.”

“You finished it _already_?” I ask, amazed. “I thought you didn’t have the plot and ending down yet?”

He shrugs and shoves his toast in his mouth.

“I figured it out.”

“You’re insane,” I tell him, smiling. “An absolute monster. I thought I was about to get a break from you and your insanity.” I stand up from the table and cross to his chair and lightly run my hand along the back of his neck.

He leans into my touch, like he always does.

“I’ll start it tonight,” I say, leaning down to press a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Since it looks like it’ll take me a week to get through.”

“Shut up, you’ll finish it in one go,” he mutters back, turning his face to kiss me more fully. I sink into it.

This isn’t new. There have been three months of kisses. Three months of breakfasts in this kitchen and late nights in his garden and afternoons on my patio squinting into the sun and three months of going to sleep and waking up beside him, and yet I fall into every action, lean into every touch.

I still can’t believe I have this, sometimes. I still can’t believe I did this.

Pulling back, I lean against the table and look at him. He follows my movement, resting his hand on my thigh and playing with the hem of my boxer shorts as he keeps drinking his coffee and eating his bacon, like his very existence in my flat doesn’t constantly upend my world.

Like I’m not helplessly head over heels for him. Like I live in a world where it’s possible he feels the same way.

Not possible. Probable. Definite.

He told me that himself. In his garden, a bottle of wine in, casually and simply, _“I think I’ve been mad for you for ages. Mad at you, too, on the surface. But mostly mad for you.”_

“Has Bunce seen it yet?” I ask him now, instead of spilling the soppy syrupy vomit that runs through my head at all hours of the day.

“No. I wanted you to read it first,” he says, his mouth full. “You know, to tell me if it’s good.”

I pick up the brick of a manuscript and look at the title page.

 _Absolute Nightmare_ , _by Simon Salisbury._

“Your name is on it,” I say, snapping my head up to stare at him. “Not Oliver Snow.”

“Yeah. Yeah it is.” He shrugs, stares at his toast, and then folds the last of it into his mouth. For once in his damnable, beautiful life, he waits until he’s swallowed to start speaking. “I figure if Mage isn’t even going to read my work, why should I shape everything I write around him?”

My heart flutters. I’ll make a rebel out of Simon Salisbury yet.

“You’re insane,” I say, dropping _Absolute Nightmare_ onto the table with a thunk that shakes our coffee mugs.

“Probably.”

I reach out and twirl a curl of his sandy bronze hair around my finger. He smiles up at me, and I let myself be brave.

“I love it.”

 

***

 

When Simon gets back to my flat for dinner at six, he’s wearing trackies.

“Oh,” he says as he walks through my sliding door and onto my rooftop patio. “I definitely did not expect this.”

His overnight bag slides down his shoulder and his hand comes up to rub at the scruff on the back of his neck. He’s wearing my old Cambridge shirt, the one with the hole in the neck that I think he literally dug out of Fiona’s litter box. He looks like an absolute fucking disaster.

“Er,” he says, “hi everyone.”

“Surprise!” Micah yells, nearly taking out Bunce’s eye as he lifts his ale.

“Babe, elbows down,” Bunce says, lowering Micah’s arm. “This isn’t a surprise party.”

“Well I’m pretty surprised,” Simon says, moving forward to give Bunce a crushing hug and slap Micah on the shoulder. He turns to Wellbelove, who is wearing a revolting shade of pink, and squeezes her into a hug that picks her up onto her toes, and then gives a handshake to Dev. Niall, behind him, gets a salute.

Simon doesn’t know if he likes Niall, because Niall only talks to him about football and dicks, and the combination makes Simon a bit uncomfortable.

I love it.

“Happy book day, love,” I mumble into his ear as I wrap my arm around his neck for a hug. “I wanted to do it right.”

“You could have told me to wear real trousers,” he mutters back, but he’s smiling.

“Would you have done it?”

He looks like he’s considering it.

“No.”

In short order Wellbelove has a beer in Simon’s hand and they’ve commandeered my tiny grill, huddled together and talking about God only knows while surrounded in a plume of smoke. At the patio table, Niall and the American take turns trying to throw cheese into each other’s mouths while Bunce and Dev whisper furiously in a corner.

“What are you two conspiring about?” I ask her, sidling up to where they’re standing. Bunce raises one eyebrow.

“What a dipshit you are,” she says immediately. “Also Dev was asking me for those uni photos.”

“You wouldn’t dare,” I shoot back. Bunce squares her ground.

“Wouldn’t I?”

“I’ll deny everything,” I sniff. “Photoshop. Slander. Libel.”

“Dinner!” Simon yells, moving away from the grill with a platter piled high with food. Every kind of grilled vegetable and mushroom and kebab.

Loving Simon Salisbury has kept me very well fed.

I bring out more wine and the bottle passes around the table as Bunce regals us with the story of her uni protests and Niall and Micah and Simon shout about football and Wellbelove and Niall start talking weird artistic terms that no one knows, and I sit back and watch as the sun sinks low over the London skyline, my arm around Simon, my wine resting comfortably on my knee.

And I feel painfully, heartbreakingly soft.

When everyone has finished eating and we’re further into our cups, I turn to Simon and bury my nose in his hair as I whisper in his ear.

“I have a surprise for you.”

He turns to look at me, a stupid, sloppy grin on his face, and leans his head back against his chair.

“You’ve done so much,” he says, shaking his head. “This has been the best book release. This is how I want all of them to go. There is 100 per cent more food involved than usual.”

Ignoring him, I stand up and clear my throat.

“If I may say a few words,” I say as solemnly as I can after three glasses of wine. “Today we celebrate _Slain_. Some would call it the pornographic product of the homosexual agenda,” I pause as Dev lets up a cheer, “but others have called it a triumph.”

Simon beams.

“Niall, would you do the honours?”

Niall reaches over to his side and hands Simon a large, framed photo which has been covered in tissue paper. Simon tears the tissue paper off eagerly, his eyes bright, his skin flushed, and then his smile drops.

His face grows redder and redder.

“Is… is this dragon pornography?” he asks, his eyes wide and alarmed. He stares between me and Niall. “Why did you give me a drawing of a dragon dick?” He looks at the art again. “A really, really big dragon dick? Oh my god, wait, is that his— Oh my god.”

“Baz commissioned it from me,” Niall says with a shrug. “As a congratulations gift.”

Bunce settles herself on the arm of Simon’s chair and wraps an arm around his shoulder.

“It’s from all of us.”

“It is not from me,” Micah argues.

“Niall, did you do this in watercolour?” Wellbelove asks, peering over me to look at the dragon genitalia.

“Soft pastels,” Niall answers back.

“Hmm,” she hums, nodding. “It’s lovely.”

“This is fucking terrifying,” Simon says, unable to look away. “I fucking hate this.”

“You should sign the frame and we should raffle it off with a copy of _Slain_ ,” Micah says, coming to look over Bunce’s shoulder. He leans closer to inspect, a curious, clinical look on his face.

Simon shakes his head and shoves the drawing under the table.

“No. No one ever needs to see this ever again.” He’s so red I think we could grill a kebab on his face, and I run a hand along the back of his neck. He hunches forward and slaps my hand away.

I don’t regret it for a single fucking second.

“You know,” Dev says, leaning back in his chair. “I know Baz is going to make fun of me, but I think _Slain_ is actually my favourite book. Like, ever.”

I place my hand back on Simon’s neck.

“Mine too,” I say gently. He glances up at me and there’s the ghost of a pissed off smile at the corner of his lips as he leans into my hand.

“Yeah, it’s definitely up there,” Niall says. “You did good, mate.”

“I cried at the garden scene,” Micah admits.

“Mate we all fucking cried at the garden scene,” Dev says, raising his beer. Simon’s face has turned ruddy and splotchy and he’s bashfully trying to hide his face in Bunce’s shoulder.

“Alright, alright, stop complimenting him,” I say, standing up. “He doesn’t deserve it, I did all the work. You should have _seen_ how he initially wanted to end it. Simon, help me get more wine?”

He ambles up from his chair goodnaturedly, grabbing empty plates and throwing a napkin at Dev as he trails me back into my flat, carefully stepping over Fiona as we head to my dark kitchen.

He drops the dishes in the sink and turns on the faucet as I dig out more wine.

“Did you like my present?” I ask, coming up behind him. Just like that first night on the bridge, my hands find his hips, my face nestles into the crook of his shoulder, and I place my lips against his neck gently. He exhales and leans back into me, and I tighten my grip, sliding my hands around his waist and folding myself entirely over him.

No,” Simon snarls, scrubbing at a dish. “You’re the fucking worst.” But then he turns off the water with a slam and covers my hands with his soapy ones. He’s all bluster. All show.

We stand there, staring out the window into the darkening city, warm and soft under the dim stove light. I love having him in my arms. I’m starting to believe he loves being there.

“What do you expect from me?” I ask him, kissing under his ear. “I’m a beast.”

***

_The King was dead._

_His blood had mixed with the snow in the garden, spreading out and staining everything, meeting the twin pools of blood that grew from under the Knight and Beast._

_Three bodies, lifeless in the snow._

_It was the Knight who moved first. Who pulled his aching body upright and looked to the side and saw the Beast — his Beast — still unconscious._

_The Beast’s red lips were paler, his skin quickly losing its ashen hue and blooming into a golden red. The scales from his face were cracking and falling off, and when the Knight reached out to gently touch one of his wings — one of the glorious wings which had protected him and cradled him — it turnt to dust in his hands._

_Everything around him in the garden was coming to life._

_He pushed himself to his knees, his own wound twinging, and pulled his body on top of the Beast’s. He didn’t know how much time he had left. When he passed from the world, however, he wanted to be in the Beast’s arms._

_The snow melted and rain dripped and the garden became sodden from snow and blood, and yet the Beast still did not breathe. He still did not move._

_“I love you,” the Knight whispered, burying his face into the Beast’s chest, turning his cheek into the sticky blood pooled there. “I love you.”_

_He was certain they were the last words he’d ever say._

_He wished he had more strength. He wished he could stand, and carry the Beast out of this garden, and set him in a boat filled with roses and give him a proper goodbye. He wished he could send him off with love and strength and bravery._

_He wished their bodies would not be left here for anyone to find._

_The Beast was his. He didn’t belong to anyone else. Even in death, the Knight didn’t want them to have him. They could not have him._

_“I love you,” he whispered. The world began to go dark, closing in on the edges of his vision, and then he felt a motion. The smallest breath of a touch. A hand running through his hair._

_“Don’t quit now, Knight,” a raspy voice said from near his ear. A voice he’d know in the dark, a voice he’d know at the end of the world. “Your journey isn’t done just yet.”_

_Pulling deep within his stores of strength, the Knight pushed back the pain and the fear and the comfortable darkness, and opened his eyes._

_The Beast smiled._


End file.
